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Emmanuelle_OVO
Retired Moderator
Retired Moderator
September 11, 2024

Do you have Solar Panels & Charge Anytime? We’d love to hear your thoughts

  • September 11, 2024
  • 106 replies
  • 1969 views
Do you have Solar Panels & Charge Anytime? We’d love to hear your thoughts

Updated on 29/04/25 by Bradley_OVO: We apprecaite all of the engagement and feedback to this article - This is no longer an open research topic at the moment. If you have further issues or questions around Solar, EVs or Charge Anytime, please reach out to the wider community to engage with the wider OVO Community user base.

 

It's an exciting time in the EV and Solar market for customers. We're looking to get some feedback from customers who have an Electric Vehicle and Solar Panels.

 

We currently offer Charge Anytime to customers with Solar Panels via a solar and Charge Anytime compatible charger. See a list of our chargers here and expand by pressing “+” to see those marked as solar compatible.

 

We understand that some customers may have a different charger that is not on our list, so we would love to get feedback from you if you have been using Charge Anytime via a compatible Electric Vehicle and have recently installed solar or are considering installing solar panels at your property.

 

Currently customers with that use Charge Anytime via a compatible Electric Vehicle can’t continue to use this service if they install solar. This is because the version of Charge Anytime that is via a compatible Electric Vehicle works due to the charging information that is sent from the car to us so we know how many kilowatt hours (kWh) of electricity have been used in each charge. Unfortunately, this method is not able to tell us whether the electricity used was from the grid or from the solar panels or storage battery in your home. For this reason we cannot currently provide this version of Charge Anytime to customers to get the discounted rate.

106 replies

Blastoise186
Super User
Super User
March 4, 2025

If you buy the panels from OVO, you can actually get a higher SEG rate.

  • Basic OVO SEG is available to everyone - 7p/kWh.
  • SEG Beyond Exclusive is available if you’re supplied by OVO and have OVO Beyond active - 12p/kWh
  • SEG Install Exclusive is available if you also have OVO supply and install the panels - 20p/kWh

You must then use a Solar-Compatible Charger - specifically an Anderson, Indra or Hypervolt unit listed from this page in order to get Charge Anytime working as well.

Securing energy by zapping security bugs... For that is The Blastoise Way! Remember, I'm just like you - AI Powered Evil Geniuses aren't Staff!
Rank 2
March 4, 2025

I'm on an E7 tariff with Ovo. They installed the panels and I have activated two options on Behond.

I get 15p but would get 20p if I had a battery. 

Rank 4
March 11, 2025

Had no idea that solar panels were an issue for smart tariffs until my smart meter arrived and I found this …

So yes be keen to take part in anything as the only reason I switched to OVO was to get a smart meter and use a cheap overnight charging tariff sadly. 

Rank 2
March 11, 2025

Snap. 

And I would also like to take part. 

 

 

Rank 4
March 11, 2025

edit to add charger (HV 3.0 Home Pro) and car (thought my understanding is that’s not relevant) which is two cars but let’s deal with the Volvo XC90 PHEV first.
 

——- 
 

I’m a bit confused by this now to be honest. 
I wasn’t aware of a compatibility issue until I read this pinned post. 
And I’d checked the compatibility page which says nothing about solar not being allowed (double negative is deliberate). 
 

So I just went in to the OVO app as apparently you don’t need the charge anytime app if you’re doing this via a charger (rather than the car). And it says I am compatible. 
But now it wants me to download the Charge Anytime app. The very thing the process listed on the website site says isn’t needed. Really odd and disconnected messaging from a customer point of view. 
 

https://forum.ovoenergy.com/electric%2Dvehicles%2D166/how%2Dto%2Dset%2Dup%2Dyour%2Dsmart%2Dcharger%2Dto%2Duse%2Dit%2Dwith%2Dcharge%2Danytime%2D16772?tid=16772&fid=166

Blastoise186
Super User
Super User
March 11, 2025

@scoob198 it would be useful if you could tell us what Charger/EV you’re trying to connect...

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Rank 4
March 11, 2025

@Blastoise186 Ta. Post edited to include that. 

Blastoise186
Super User
Super User
March 11, 2025

Then the solution is easy - use your Hypervolt charger via the Charge Anytime app. This charger is already Solar Compatible with the Charge Anytime integration, so you don’t need to be added to this trial. Do not connect the EV in this setup - it won’t be accepted.

Any problems, call the team on 0330 175 9678.

Securing energy by zapping security bugs... For that is The Blastoise Way! Remember, I'm just like you - AI Powered Evil Geniuses aren't Staff!
Rank 4
March 11, 2025

Thanks. That’s odd. I can of course re-download the Charge Anytime app. 
 

I’m trying to follow the process OVO provides - copied here (which is important to me because the Charge Anytime app locked out my charger for 16 hours when I tried this the first time (screenshot attached of what it looked like for 16 hours until I deleted charge anytime so that I could charge my car))

—-

If you have a compatible charger (such as an Indra or Ohme) then you need to link the charger to your OVO online account. You don’t need the additional Charge Anytime app. Ohme have made step by step instructions on how to set up Charge Anytime.

 

—-

 

Blastoise186
Super User
Super User
March 11, 2025

If it fails to connect after an hour…

First port of call: OVO Charge Anytime team: 0330 175 9678 or chargeanytime@ovo.com .

Second port of call: Hypervolt Support: https://www.hypervolt.co.uk/

I will ask the Forum Moderators to get the site updated with the new info. It seems it may have been missed. ​@Abby_OVO can you grab that one?

Securing energy by zapping security bugs... For that is The Blastoise Way! Remember, I'm just like you - AI Powered Evil Geniuses aren't Staff!