hi Jeffus,

So as I take readings daily and now go to my account online and enter the figure for the 23rd you are saying the bill shown for the last payment period outstanding at present will update to a correct reading and not have the estimated element. Well I can certainly try this however the previous quarter we enterred the dat on the 21st and 22nd and the bill did not have any estimates added?? so is it still not a computer software problem?

As to your other question My remotely reading Meter doesnt require manual reading, I do so myself for my own purposes. Suppliers, (Others) can remotely read these Meters, OVO just choose not to do so!  

Hi @Colin Wheeler 

Thanks for the update. That is what ovo have said on the forum as you can see in the screen shot. Post a reading on the 23rd and see what happens. This has worked for other customers who have posted on the forum.

As you know, no one on the forum can access your bills so I can’t comment on your previous bills obviously. Best to contact customer support to double check account specific issues. 

03303035063

Alternatively post screen shots of your meter reading page and those bills if you want anyone on the forum to have a look. Just blank out any personal information. Obviously even with that it is difficult to comment on account specific issues.

If you post how you get on I am sure it will help other customers.

If you have already found other suppliers that can and choose to read your AMR meters why are you still with OVO if you don't mind me asking? Why don't you simply switch?

Can you provide the names of these suppliers so other customers with AMR meters can make use of these suppliers. Do any of them offer 30 min time of use tariff? 

Have you spoken to any ovo AMR customers who have switched to other suppliers?

Have you ever asked ofgem the regulator about domestic supplier obligations around AMR metres? They may be able to signposted legislation on supplier obligations consumeraffairs@ofgem.gov.uk that helps you.

Good luck and I hope you get everything sorted soon.

Afternoon All,

Not sure if this is any help to other AMR meter users, But after a very lengthy call to various departments this morning in South Africa, we appear to have made some progress in understanding the issues we were having over input of our import meter readings. 

It was nothing to do with timing of input of readings but as we suspected an issue with the computer software and it’s programming! It wouldn’t matter whether we were inputting our data on the day after period end it would still generate the same result.

Thanks to Jeffus for Info though.

Apparently The readings we were inputting were considered outside of the parameters set as “reasonable” in the accounts software so the online account flags up a box saying this is high “are you sure” but when you confirm, it does not add the reading to the account it instead automatically generates an internal query for this to be checked, and puts an estimation on the bill shown. 

I have been told this is done in house and is not a department that is “Customer facing”.

I would question how this can be investigated if the customer is not involved??  The simplest answer to this to aid the investigation would be an e mail or message to the customer as to why the reading was high? not just sit on it internally. 

We are high winter users and very low summer consumers of Electricity but it seems OVO  system cannot cope with this.

I am of course looking at other suppliers etc. to see how we would fare if we swap and am informed that Octopus among others, can indeed read AMR meters and can also, with customer input build a Half Hour profile with a years worth of Data to get an accurate profile.

Of course there will allways be the compromise of not accessing all the bells and whistles offers that come with so called “smart Meters”nor the problems that also come with them. sticking with the AMR meter that has and is serving my purposes  as I am not really interested in flu flam offers.  

All I really want, and I suspect others do to, is a supply at a reasonable cost and a fair payment for the green energy I provide, If OVO can’t do this then so be it! 

I would like to know other Customers experiences with AMR meters and their interaction with OVO and others so that I can make informed decisions.

If Any one is having similar problems persistance is the key the answers are out there!

CW

Hi @Colin Wheeler 

If you search for AMR in the forum you will find some users with these setups, including Octopus customers. Tag them in this thread like I have done below and you may get a response from some of them. I doubt you will get a reply otherwise.

For example this Octopus customer was let down by Octopus who couldn't read their AMR meter it turned out even when Octopus installed the AMR  meter.

I haven’t actually seen anyone post on the forum where they could get Octopus to read their AMR meter as a domestic customer, but things may have changed and obviously this is only a small number of AMR posters on this forum.

Have you found any domestic users with AMR meter with Octopus where they are reading 30 min data? Can you post a link if you have? It is always good to have examples to share with future posters.

Just be very careful you are actually talking to knowledgeable people who actually know what your setup is in Octopus.

Did you make any progress with anyone reading your AMR meter @Edinburghadvisers ?

If you switch it would be great to hear how it goes @Colin Wheeler 

There is a comment in the above thread about ovo being able to read AMR meters but not offer smart tariffs. Perhaps give this to the ovo staff you have been talking to if you haven't already.

The only references I could find on the Octopus site related to AMR are for business customers. Did you find any relating to domestic customer out of curiosity?

https://octopus.energy/blog/business-electricity-meters/#:~:text='AMR'%20stands%20for%20automatic%20meter,you%20first%20come%20on%20supply.

Good luck!

Same Old, Same Old,

I Know members cannot access others accounts, however here we are at then of another billing period for us, 22nd. We enterred the figures for 21st (last day of previous moth and 22nd day we were told to add new reading and hey presto online account still shows estimated bills, (and a severe under estimae at that.) As our online account is now showing an under estimation based on last months under estimation it now shows us as severely in debt to OVO. this is the kind of issue that got the post office owners into trouble. Fortunately we monitor our own usage dsily so hsve been able to make accurate and documented payments. So if it comes to the crunch we will have evidence.

The fixes suggested in the postings on this subject do not work on our account so are not the fix suggested. When we add our meter readings to the account the computer software does not seem able to accept them (they are high at this time of year due electric boiler) so does not add them to the account but adds its own estimate. This has now happend to every bill since we were forced to join OVO (migrated from SSE). 

It will never be sorted as OVO have a don’t care, dont listen Policy it seems! 

You may not have seen suggestions in these forums that the closing reading for a billing period should be taken on the first day of the following period. This ensures that usage on the last day of the period is covered by the reading. Any manual reading is timed at the preceding midnight for billing purposes; if there is no such reading, an estimate will be used. 

If a reading you submit isn’t accepted, Support should be able to help. 

Hi firedog,

Thats why I posted as we have been having this issue for more than 4 months, We have been entering our readings on the first day of the new billing period as suggested here by yourself and others. We have also tried on several occasions to get the support staff in South Africa to help, after lengthy phonecalls and several levels of staff they have been unable to enter the readings eithe, Nor has the Bot, In all cases we have ended up with an estimated amount showing on our account, and a sverely under estimation at that.

The problem is a software one, in that limits of usage have been set in the software such that if they are exceeded by a manual entry the system “dithers” and places an estimate to the limits programmed. The support staff are unable to override it and there is no access to the programmers to get the system amended.

We are a high winter user sometimes over 100kWh per day so when we add our monthly figure it throws a spanner in the works. We have not been with OVO long enough for the system to “learn”, if it is even capable of doing this! We were a migrated customer from SSE and that process went on for over a year so we can’t believe we are the only customer in this position.

repeated attempts to get the issue resolved it is still on going. 

If the managers of this Forum are worth their salt they would be flagging the issues back to the  “non customer Facing” areas of the company so that some of the other issues I see raised here were dealt with as well as ours!

I am sorry but my statement still stands thet OVO just aren’t interested, and will remain until they prove to me otherwise.

Thanks for your interest  though!   

Hey @Colin Wheeler,

I’m sorry for the issues you’re having,

I wonder why your account balance doesn’t update when you submit a meter reading. With our live billing system, your account balance should update accordingly within 24-48 hours. 

Have you thought about getting a smart meter installed? With half hourly meter readings your account balance will always be accurate and up to date. 

Hi Emmanuelle,

You would have to ask your billing/accounts/computer people why the account balance doesnt update properly. We are tearing our hair out trying to get OVO to deal with us properly.

As I said in my last post, The problem appears to be that as a  3 phase high use customer in the winter (sometimes over 150kWh a day) the Computer system doesn’t accept our readings and puts an estimate in instead and a very low one at that. 

We spent over an hour on the phone to south Africa speaking to 4 different levels of customer service personel last month and none of them could update the readings, they said they would start an investigation and get back to us, that never happened.

We then tried to use the auto system and that resulted in the account being updated with another low estimate and not the figure we gave.

We have just received our bill for the current period and it is a complete work of Fiction, an estimate based on an estimate. There is Also a worrying factor in that, Firstly, the Bill shows the figure we enterred on the auto system on the 27th as being the one we put in on the 21st of last month (the end date of our last period) and not the one we actually gave on 27th.(The estimated opening read on the 22nd is 462 Kwh lower than the one we enterred on the 21st??) Secondly this latest bill is also calculated on Decembers prices not the ones we were informed were to be charged from 1st of January. 

As for the issue of a Smart Meter, No Thanks, we don’t need any more Hassle. 

It’s not just our Import that is affected Our Export has been a shambles from the start with OVO and is still an ongoing problem.

We are a NET exporter of solar Power having 193 panels connected to the grid via a 3 Phase ½ hour remote reading (Mobile Phone network) Meter. This meter is remotely readable for both Import and Export but OVO refuse to do so.  

WE can’t trust OVO to get our bills right and havent been able to since being migrated from SSE, so we are doing our own calculations based on actual figures and paying what we know we owe. The whole sorry saga is a shambles and no one in OVO wants to engage with us to sort it out. 

Apologies for unloading this here but there just isn’t any other way of getting the message back to OVO., I don’t know if you as a Moderator/Manager, have any methods of drawing attention to these issues but as it appears OVO use the forum as a method of informing their customers then perhaps it should be used for feedback as well! 

Thanks for your interest.

C

Ah I understand better now @Colin Wheeler, it sounds like due to your set up, the meter readings aren’t being added onto the account immediately, they’re getting sent to our billing team for verification because the system believes them to be ‘out of line’.

In this case, I do think that a smart meter would be beneficial and resolve this issue. 

Good Morning,

Thankyou however this begs the question “How long does it take for the Billing team to adjust the system” as this has been going on for more than 4 months.

rgds C. 

Apologies if this question has been raised by others before me but I am always puzzled by the readings OVO have used to calculate my monthly bills.

On the 19th day of each month, I input my gas/electricity readings religiously via the portal but when I receive my bills, OVO always add 5KW to the electric reading and around 4kw to the gas reading I have given them.  I cannot understand why the opening reading on my bills are always the estimated ones instead of the ones I have given OVO.

This has been the situation since OVO took over from SSE.  I have tried to contact customer service on many an occasion to get an answer but each time come up with a blank.  I’ve been told my calculation day is the 19th of each month hence why I give my readings on this date.

If anyone can explain this billing puzzle then great as I always feel I can’t trust the accuracy of my bills and before you ask, NO I don’t want to change to a smart meter.

Hi @newjerseyminx ,

Quick question, but why are you refusing Smart Meters? They are ultimately the easiest solution to this exact type of issue.

After researching this, it has been suggested that a reading the day after your billing date is best for a manual submission. This mimics the smart meter which sends readings just after midnight. 
What the OVO system appears to do is add an estimation to any readings on the last billing day, assuming it needs to finish that days usage. 
There has been an update for the suggested date for readings to reflect this 

The advice/trick to avoid a small estimate at the end of your billing period is to submit the meter readings on (the morning of) the day AFTER your billing period end

That reading then gets attributed to the last day of the billing period, so no estimate.

eg. Mine ends on the 23rd so I sent my gas meter reading on the 24th. no estimate.

(My current billing period, 5-½ days in, does not show an opening figure yet, and won't until I send in another reading).

Brilliant!  I will try sending my next readings in on the morning of the 20th May then check what’s been used when I receive my next bill.  Thanks

Hey @newjerseyminx,

It looks like our volunteers did a superb job of answering this for you. I thought I would add a link to some resources that could help you! 

https://www.ovoenergy.com/help/article/how-to-submit-your-gas-and-electricity-readings

Let us know how you get on after submitting your readings on the 20th 

*Edited by Mod*

Why is my bill estimated when I send a reading to you 

I like a phone call 

Not sure why this is an idea … but when do you send your readings @Rita Meredith ?

The 12 Aug and it's estimated 

Yes but how does that relate to your billing times?

From their website 

If you send on another date, they will estimate the rest of the billing period