Why is my Future Annual Consumption estimate so persistently high?

This doesn’t tally with our usage at all.  One month 2 years ago they charged us £734 in a month and we weren’t even in the country.

When you log into your OVO account, what do you see for your usage for the year, so far? This is what mine looks like at the moment. As you can see, it shows the cost for electricity and gas and also the kWh use for each fuel. What does yours show?

That is the amount they charged us after our discount as our son has Ulcerative Colitis.  We are also out of the house from 7.30 am to 4.30pm daily but on this occasion we were in the US.

​@Elwell1624  It’s always best when trying to find out why billing has gone wrong to concentrate on the usage figures - the kWh - rather than the costs - the £. It’s the meter readings that form the basis for all billing, but costs and billed amounts can change for all sorts of reasons - different unit prices, discounts, fines or goodwill payments, for example. 

If the DD calculator thinks the account is in debit, the recommended monthly amount will be inflated by 1/6 of the current debt + 1/12 of the annual cost of fuel. We can’t tell whether this is the cause of the ridiculously high DD until you give us some figures to work from.

It rather sounds as if there is a long-standing error, perhaps with a meter reading wrongly recorded or submitted two or three years ago, which led to underestimated charges that are coming back to bite you. So long as your online account shows meter readings from before 2023 and up to now, it should be possible to spot where any error crept in.

That’s most likely just standard wording (basically empty threats to make you sit up).

However if it should happen that you do get a letter or letters from Debt Collectors then refer to this article, read and take onboard the information in the first post, particuarly the ‘2 Important Facts’
Then you’ll want link #5 “Letter to you about a debt but you are already disputing that debt with the supplier”

​@Elwell1624 good morning, I hope you’re well.

The screenshots you’ve shared show that there was previously a large debt balance, which would have generated the large suggested increase to the Direct Debit, as the aim would have been to clear the debt and get you back into credit, whilst still paying for your usage.

If you’re speaking to OVO about this they should be able to explain to you what happened previously and, as ​@Firedog has mentioned, whether there was any sort of issue on our side that caused errors in the billing that were rectified down the line.

Let us know when you’ve heard back from our Complaints team about it.

This has been a bone of contention on my account for at least 2 years, so I know that it’s not an issue caused by using EAC figures rather than accumlated data from my actual Smart Meters. I feel like this is one that needs a wider dicussion across the customer base. Unfortunately this ongoing issue has been the main reason I have now left OVO this week. But in a nut shell, it appears that OVO is over estimating customer’s annual usage and their support team don’t alway seem to be able to accertain why (nor do anything about it to stem excess DD amounts).

Over the last 2 years I have consistently been building credit, to the extent I have been lowering my DD at suggested figure on the DD screen at every opportunity. (Credit was even accumlating at the rate, that about every 4/5 days if I went onto the Direct Debit Screen it showed I could lower it by a few pounds).

However, it got to the point that the accumlated funds were 10x the monthly direct debit and I’d never had a single month in 4 years where my bill for the month was higher than the DD. The final straw for me when I had an e-mail to say that they were going to increase my direct debit by just under 2.5x what it was. When I rung them, I got the normal spiel about it being set so it’s one month in credit for the following March.

SO…. I did an excercise and calculated on my fixed term, and for when it ended the variable rate that it would move to, taking the maximum monthly electricity and gas figure I’d had since I’d been with OVO, and using that to work out exactly how much it would be if I used the same amount of electricity and gas every month, at the highest month in my whole history… And it came in as much lower. (about 2/5ths per month of the direct debit they were asking for - so I would have been accumulating a huge amount of credit).

I spoke to them on the phone in length, again had the same spiel, and they agreed to freeze my direct debit at 10% less than they suggested for three months, and recommended I claim a refund if it is accumlating again at the end of those three months.

… Which I did… And as soon as I did that refund, the next week, I got an e-mail to say my direct debit was going to be raised even higher again.

… So I spoke in length to a very helpful agent, and we went through all of the individual figures I’d previously worked out to try an understand why my direct debit was what it was. And this was where the penny dropped for the agent, becuase in her words “I don’t understand why you’re paying this much with your history of usage over the last 4 years”… And she worked out that the “projected annual usuage” for my account with electrity was wildly out (and the gas was a little high, but not enough to be concerned about). So much so, my account was projected my annual electricty usage as 3x the units that I’d ever used in a single year since I lived in my property. She was quite clear there was a problem with the way the system was generating my predicted usage and explained all my issues over predicted monthly cost and direct debit actually stemmed from this issue. So she escallated it to their technical team, becuase it appeared to be a foundational issue with this calculation and she admitted was not providing a correct figure. I was confident that she had a full understanding of the issue, managed to get to grip with all of the figures we’d talked to and she’d got to the crux of the problem in passing it over to be fixed… So I was to be called in the next 2/3 weeks with a resolve but until then a note was put on my account to prohibit any direct debit rises for the next three months as a safeguard.

… All this was 10 months ago, I never got that call. I have since rang 4 times since for an update. The first time had to explain it all again and go through all the figures as I was told all the same spiel again, despite having a log number for the escallation… and that it would be raised as a new complaint. The second time I was told the complaint was showing as resolved (but hadn’t been) so they would need to raise it again. The thrid time, I rang becuase my direct debit had been once again - and was told the escallation would be chased. Again never receiving the promised call back. And then the forth time, which was 2 months ago, I was told the original complaint hadn’t been raised as the “correct type of issue”; after having to go through the entire set of figures and conversation again, I was told it “had now been escallated in the right way,” to the right teams and someone would call me in the next 4 week to update me on how they were resolving the problem with this system issue generating too high annual usage for me.

…. Needless to say that call never came and my last fixed term came to an end. (With my account being roughly 8x in credit of my monthlt direct debit). I can only believe that this change to their ‘March’ calculation and this over inflated calculation of energy usage which is higher than the energy I’ve ever used, is somehow deliberately built into the system for them to profit over the excess credit they have from their customers. I no longer trust their integrity and have now moved to another supplier that just takes a DD out for the exact amount of bill for that last month - so I know I’m paying for exactly what I’ve used and they aren’t skimming over any credit they have swimming in their accounts.

I encourage everyone who had a direct debit to do the same. Have your unit rate and standing charges, work out what the most you’ve used in a year is and see using that volume of units if it’s anywhere near what they think you’ll be using… If it’s not, it appears that they are doing it to everyone else too and haven’t made any changes to their system to recitify this (deliberately or otherwise).
 

I had a similarly inflated FAC for gas at a couple of years ago, at one point it was 3x my actual annual use.
(At the time it was a non-communicating SMETS1 meter so I had to send in readings, it has since been replaced by a SMETS2 meter which communicates by itself).

I had the forum support team looking into the problem and  it wasn't OVO who were inflating the FAC, OVO get the FAC figures from Kaluza.

In turn Kaluza get the FAC figures from the central bodies that administer industry codes and settlement balances, those are Elexon for electricity and Xoserve for gas.

The inflated FAC for my gas was originating at Xoserve.
Two companies away from OVO, and of course OVO do not have any control over them.

We never actually managed to find a reason why Xoserve were inflating the figure.

I did however manage to reduce it myself over time - simply by sending in daily gas meter readings, basically imitating what a smart meter does.
Yes a bit of a PITA, but it soon became routine and my gas FAC started to reduce to what it should be.
It wasn't a steady reduction, some days it wouldn't change, other days it would rocket down.

Now that I’ve had a communicating SMETS2 gas meter for over a year the FAC for gas is about where it should be. (Or rather was, because last month I switched away from OVO for other reasons).

​@mogstermc What a saga! I really feel for you. BTDT, as they say. A few comments:
  

… we’d confirmed that the information from both Smart meters were fully being received by OVO and in latter half of that time had been already upgraded to SMETS2.

This may explain why the problem remained so intractable. When my own meter was upgraded from SMETS1 to SMETS2 three years ago, I noticed a wildly inaccurate Future Annual Consumption (FAC) estimate on my Plan page (on the web, not in the app). I learnt that having a new meter installed effectively removes the usage history as far as estimating the FAC is concerned. We started with something like the Ofgem Typical Domestic Consumption Value (TDCV) and I watched the FAC fall over the next year until it ended up matching the previous 12 months’ usage on the meter’s first birthday. 

It shouldn’t take that long, of course, because the infamous ‘industry’ figure, Estimated Annual Consumption (EAC), is supposed to be adjusted each time there is a meter reading. This was clearly not happening in my case, and probably yours, too. 

Now, more recently a different problem arose. I have my suspicions as to why, but no explanation has been forthcoming. The ‘projection service’ (an internal automated system that is supposed to calculate the FAC) was in the habit of polling my meter for its readings once a week, but suddenly stopped being able to in June this year. I never understood why it should need to do this since my meter was happily supplying daily readings anyway, but there must have been a reason. Anyway, this meant that my FAC reverted to the industry EAC. This state lasted for 7 or 8 weeks, at which point the projection service started using the daily readings my meter was submitting anyway. That’s where we are today, with the FAC updating daily to match the annual advance of my meter to the nearest Wh (today’s annual advance = difference between today’s reading and the one from 365 days ago).

So, you’re not entirely alone. However, the way you’ve apparently been treated is abysmal. Old OVO Support hands frequenting these forums often don’t wait long before recommending entering a formal complaint. Once that’s done, the clock starts ticking, and if the problem hasn’t been solved eight weeks later, the victim can ask the Energy Ombudsman (EO) to get involved. This isn’t cheap for the supplier, so just the threat of an EO referral can help concentrate the minds of those dragging their heels.

I think, though, that there’s no hidden agenda here. It’s very unlikely that the DDs of some or all customers are being inflated in order to improve the supplier’s cash flow. 

Thanks for this cautionary tale. It may entice other victims of a flaky projection service out of the woodwork so their problems can be dealt with properly. 

​@mogstermc I’m really sorry to hear of what’s happened, and that you’ve now left OVO.

As someone with a background in complaints at OVO, I can confirm that this is a complaint I’ve seen a few times. It’s not that common, but sometimes the EAC can be incorrect, and this will drive up the Direct Debit to an amount over what it needs to be.

In this scenario, the advisor just needs to calculate your actual EAC, and raise a case to the correct team to get it amended, who’ll send the correct figures to the Industry. Unfortunately, it may be that you’ve spoken to advisors who are new and don’t know how to do these calculations, and the fact that the service you’ve received because of this has led you to leave OVO is a real shame.

I’ll make sure that this is all logged accordingly, and I wish you all the best with your new supplier.