Are you reguarly going into emergency credit, or perhaps paying off a debit balance?

eg. Maybe there was a debit balance calculated (rightly or wrongly) when you moved from SSE to OVO?

If/when you use emergency credit they you have to pay for what you have used from the next top up, plus it hasn’t been taking a daily standing charge while in emergency credit mode and so any accumulated standing charges are also taken all at once from your next top up.

Of course the amount taken will vary depending on how long you were in emergency mode and how much power you used.

If you have a debit balance then you may have agreed for a set amount to be taken from each top up to pay that debit back.

If it’s always a fixed amount or percentage (£5 or 10%) less than what you top up then the second one sounds the more likely.
Does your account online or in the app show any signs of a debit?

See also:
 

Hello Nukecad

Thanks for your response, it’s appreciated.

I’ve never used emergency credit.

I’ve also never been made aware of any debt as a result of the handover from SSE to Ovo or otherwise.

To compound matters, I can’t create an online Ovo account - the page keeps reporting an error and to try again later. I employed Ovo customer services to help but all they could do was register me on the payment portal, which doesn’t give any account details.

I’m not happy at paying a 10% premium every time I top up so I suppose the only option is to go back to customer services? 

Online Services are not available for PAYG Customers, other than the OVO Top-Up App and PAYG Payment Portal. If you desire more access, you'll need to migrate to PAYM

Difficult to tell what may be going on here, but Is it a percentage or is it a set £5 amount?

ie If you top up say £30 then is it still £5 or only £3?

Which one it is may give someone a clue as to what may be causing it.

(An off the wall thought that is unlikely but just possible - how are you making the payments, and is it possible that your bank/card/service is taking a transaction charge each time?)

Hello Blastoise186

Thanks for taking the time to respond.

Please forgive my ignorance but what is ‘PAYM’ please?

Hello Nukecad

Thanks for following up.

I’ve only ever topped up by £50 at a time. I’ll try an experiment later by topping up with different amounts, and over shorter periods, logging the results. At least then I will have clear evidence to present when the inevitable phone call takes place.

Please forgive my ignorance but what is ‘PAYM’ please?

PAY Monthly - in other words have the meter changed from a top-up account to a credit account where you either pay by direct debit or on demand as you get billed.

With smart meters that change can be done remotely without having to physically change the meter, which make it much faster to change your account type with just a phone call.

Thanks for clarifying Nukcad.

I have no intention of paying by direct debit, as I do not trust energy companies’ methods. Paying as billed is an option I hadn’t considered, so that is valuable advice.

After I have exhausted my experiments and consulted customer services on the same, it may be my only viable option, if I’m to keep abreast of my account.

Both you and Blastoise186 have been very helpful. Thank you.

I’ve never really had a problem with DD’s other than:

SSE were always setting them too low so you could get into debit balance if not careful.

OVO’s computer does sometimes tend to set them higher than needed, but if/when that happens then you can often put them down by 10% for 3-months yourself on your online account, or failing that phone support to get the DD amount reduced.

In the end though even if it is set a bit too high it’s still your money and just builds a credit on your account. (Yes, I know some people don’t like that either).

PS. Getting a bit technical here:
Why the recommended DD can sometimes be set higher than needed gets complicated, betwen us we have identified a few reasons why it can happen and what to do to fix them.
eg. Mine can currently be too high because of an error in my Future Assessed Consumption (FAC) for gas. (My electricity FAC is correct, it’s just the gas one that’s wrong).
I know why that FAC error started happening and have been sucessfully working on getting it down to where it should be simply by sending in more frequent meter readings. (A few weeks ago I got a new gas smart meter fitted and once OVO start getting daily readings from it the FAC should soon be correct again).

Hey ​@KBH 

Could it be that there’s an arrears balance being paid off?

The support team will be able to help with this. They’ll have access to your account.
 

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