Need help with FIT payments

Hey @sandmark 

I’m really sorry to hear about this.

Let me have our Forum_Support reach out to you about this. You’ll receive a Private Message here soon: https://forum.ovoenergy.com/inbox/overview 

Have you tried this?

Raman-complaints@ovoenergy.com

I too have had issues with OVO and their FIT payment schedule.  Like @sandmark, we are in our 70s and I estimate our FIT payment based on the meter reading submitted.  This helps us budget through the quarters with things like heating oil purchase.  Since the lamentable switchover from SSE to OVO, I’ve had nothing but trouble and delay.  My June payment was received in December after two months of phone calls, emails, and stress.  This late payment put us in an overdraft situation because of the purchase of winter heating oil that I had budgeted for based on the payment being received by September.  It has been explained to me now several times that the way OVO operate is:
to gather all the meter readings during the “reading month”
these are then sent to Ofgem at the beginning of the following month (the “processing month”)
payment is then (allegedly) made to OVO by Ofgem of their customer readings at the beginning of the next month (the “payment month”)
In reality, therefore, it is potentially 8 - 10 weeks after your meter reading is submitted that you “may” receive payment.
There are also constant references to “initial hand over teething problems”.  I say it’s inefficiency and ineptitude.

I submitted my last 2023 quarter reading on December 9th.  Their email acknowledgement cites:
 

Here we now are at just about the end of the first week of March and I’ve had neither the Statement nor the payment.  I will be calling them again on Monday, and I envisage another two months of hassle and stress trying to get this payment from them!
I have today submitted the meter reading for the end of the first 2024 quarter and am not expecting to receive anything in this regard until on/about 27th May!!  Interestingly, their online link submitted in their reminder email to me was not working (yet again!) so I have had to resort to another method!  I too am considering switching my FIT account to another supplier and really cannot understand why SSE passed the baton to such an inefficient entity as OVO. 

@Jeffus - I also endeavoured to contact the OVO (previous) CEO (Stephen Fitzpatrick) and had absolutely no acknowledgement so I doubt that Raman Bhatia and his team will perform any better!

Good luck everybody!

Good day @Emmanuelle_OVO.  Have just come off the phone from the FITS team having queried the late payment (again) of my FIT.  i was advised that the payment had been prepared/sent out on 28th February and that I should receive it on Thursday 14th March.  Royal Mail advertise1st Class mail is delivered next day, 2nd Class Post is delivered after two working days.  International mail is cited as taking 3-5 working days for delivery.  My cheque, therefore, from OVO in Bristol should have been received either on Thursday 29th Feb or Friday 1st March.  Indeed, it could also make a theoretical journey to and from the other side of the world in the time that it will take it to travel the 62.5 miles from OVO to my front door.  As with everything else at OVO, I was quoted that it “takes 10 working days” for a cheque to be delivered.  I was told that customers who have opted to be paid by BACs will have received their payments into their accounts only 3 working days after release of funds, the inference being that I should perhaps opt to have my FIT payment made in this manner.   It is precisely because OVO cannot be trusted to deliver on time and when they say they will that I choose to remain as a recipient of a cheque.  In that way, I can track my payment and monitor the performance of OVO and not make OVO’s job “easier” by becoming an account number instead of a customer whose business it purports to value.  If the cheque does not arrive on Thursday as advised, I shall be making (another) complaint and I shall be using the intervening days to investigate an alternative energy supplier and FIT licensee.  After 12 trouble-free years with SSE as my FIT licensee,  I am sorry to say that  my first year with OVO in this role has been nothing short of lamentable.

Hi Sandmark,

I feel really sorry for your position BUT I am in a worse one …. They are simply refusing to engage with me and I just spend my life being passed around the off shore call centers.

ALL there staff decline to provide a surname and so you can never get back to the same person.

Compliant handlers are all in off shore call centers - there names are so unique you can easily find them on Linkedin

Does anybody know if the community managers work for OVO ??

Good luck everybody in dealing with these people

It’s coming up to the two year anniversary of non payment of my exported energy and two years of complaining to OVO without any action… until today!

I actually got a phone call from OVO just now, a nice lady called Thembisa, who went through the opening meter reading, todays export meter reading and calculated the units unpaid and told me the rate to be paid which I agreed. Then the amount, which I also agreed. She said this has to be approved by Ofgem then paid.

I also had a conversation yesterday which got my export meter verification from an email I sent in November.

While I don’t yet have money in the bank, this is real progress and it now feels like the beginning of the end of a long road of complaining. 
It’s not clear why this has all finally happened, but I will tell you the process I’ve been through which has got me here.

Phone calls to customer services approximately every two months, 03301027421, patiently going through the problem very politely and some humour. Checking on progress of my complaint quoting the reference number and date. Not screaming when they tell me it is closed! Raising a new complaint, recording date and number and details of call and name of representative.

Concurrently I raised a complaint with the Energy Ombudsman which they screwed up, appealed the decision and why they were wrong, got a new decision which was right. Notified OVO at my next bi monthly call.

Ombudsman received an email from OVO say all remedies were done and all good. Not true, they did nothing which I advised to Ombudsman.

Rang OVO again got transferred to department handling Ombudsman complaints and gave him all the details and embarrassed him as his department had lied to Ombudsman. What’s this the turning point, don’t know.

At the suggestion on here I emailed CEO and told him my woes, never got a reply, but things started happening and suddenly my calls were getting positive responses. Then, todays phone call.

So, which bit worked, I don’t know, but relentless pressure, Ombudsman ruling and CEO email may all have played a part.

I am going to miss my regular calls to OVO, like a hole in the head.

Thank you Thembisa for today’s phone call.

Good luck everyone.

Hi Emmanuelle,

When you ask about MikeT13’s resoltion can you see if you can find somebody who can address the meter install that your company did to  my home but despite knowing there was solar there decided to install a meter with no export reading ??

Be really usefull to find someone to deal with the root cause rather than the complain about it.

Cheers

Martin 

Hi Christopher

I fee so sorry for you - your left with the task of being the face of OVO to the public and it appears all you can do is say sorry ….. :-(

In terms of an update …. absolutely nothing has happend …

Literally all that I need to resolve the issue at this stage is to get the correct smart meter fitted to my house and that now appears impossible - if I try and book a smart meter install your system says your not doing any of them right now ….

I feel really sorry for the poor customers who have been moved onto you guys without there consent …..

I’m coming to the conclusion that OVO are really a company worth NOT doing business with at all cost. which is a great pity

I’ll let you know if anybody ‘reaches out’ to me to address these issues.

Regards

Martin