Is the OVO website really going to be down for the rest of 2023?

Hey, welcome back @Caino78 ,

I can confirm that if you’ve moved over from SSE, you will definitely be on the new billing platform rather than the legacy one. The plan (which I think I can reveal openly) was always to put SSE veterans on the new platform by default.

I also know that the old system has now been turned off almost completely. So it wouldn’t make sense to have migrated you there. :)

@DavidG58 its not the website or app that’s being upgraded, it’s your account that’s being transferred from an old system to the ‘new’ one that most customers are now on.

It’s not that new it’s just a lot newer than the one your account is on!!

I can also give another example of an “upgrade” that’s actually more of a “migration”, albeit in a different context.

Web hosting companies often use stuff like WHM/cPanel or Plesk to act as control panels for the servers and manage whatever customer websites are hosted on them, while also providing a way for the customers to get in to manage their own website - in the case of WHM/cPanel, the WHM side is for the server admin and the cPanel side is for the customer. A bit like how for OVO, MyOVO is the customer side that you access which lets you into your account only, and there’s an “admin control panel” for OVO to access that can get into all of them.

When you move accounts from one WHM/cPanel Server to another as part of a hardware upgrade or hardware refresh, you can’t just copy/paste all the files and databases over because literally everything would break. Instead, you use the provided tools in WHM to migrate the accounts from the old server to the new one. While all the server admin basically does is press a few buttons, in the background this fires up a ton of scripts, plugins and other tools that temporarily stops the server, scoops up all the accounts from the old server, sends them across to the new one and causes the new server to create, provision and restore those accounts to the same state, then starts everything back up. If needed, the data  for each account gets converted on the fly when it arrives at the new server.

However, if the old server has features turned on that the new one doesn’t support or you try to migrate from a server running Apache to one running NGINX (or the other way round), there is a risk things might break or the migration could fail. In those cases, extreme care has to be taken to convert the accounts before or during migration to ensure they keep working afterwards.

It’s actually a lot more complicated than that but digging that deep goes beyond the scope of this forum.

It’s a similar story with the Apollo → Orion Migration. You can’t just copy/paste everything over - it has to go through the migration process which (among other things) converts the account data to work with the new system. And that also means verifying everything with a bunch of other systems and making sure the features match.

I do ‘get’ that it’s a complicated process, but we are not talking about a back street business doing an ad hoc upgrade, OVO really should bring in sufficient resources to resolve this in a more timely fashion, predicting up to 9 months wait at the start does not meet the expectations of customers of multi million £ businesses 

it really is farcical that they must believe it’s OK

we can’t see our tariff or any change options, useage, credit balance or not, check that interest is being correctly applied etc, totally unacceptable , web chat is often ‘not available’ I don’t have time to make a lengthy phone call to find out something I should already have readily available 

I don’t even get emailed bills, despite requesting that as a minimum need 

you really couldn’t make it up , if we were on a financial penalty per week to get fixed I somehow think that might focus the minds of OVO management , can the ombudsman enforce such a thing , I am going to do some research 

I’ve tried logging into my account to receive a message saying that the website is unavailable until the end of 2023.  I’ve been trying to get a refund of the credit on my account for over 6 months and have tried the webchat, phoning and sending a complaint by email. I also saw the recent feature on Watchdog on The One Show and thinking this is probably a good avenue.  Does anyone have any suggestions how I get these people to engage?

Hi @cazjardine

That doesn't sound great.

I would try calling the OVO collections number and see if they will process a refund. 

0800 0699 831

If you are on the Variable rate plan you can ask them for 100% of your balance to be returned although obviously this will impact your direct debits.

Up to you how much credit you leave for budgeting getting through winter.

How much credit do you have on your account and how much is your Direct Debit currently? 

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

I don’t have that power myself as a forum volunteer. However, the forum moderators are on regular patrol here and will probably stop by sooner or later.

However, I do know that your online account will be re-activated soon. There’s been whispers that it might be ready by October but please don’t rely on this - the target to get it done is by December 2023 but it could be faster.

You were on the legacy Apollo system which has been shut down because it was unreliable and there was barely anyone still on it. You’re being moved to the new billing platform that’s built in-house but it sounds like your account is one of those that required manual attention to migrate.

You might also be getting an automatic refund soon for unrelated reasons. You’ll receive an email if that’s the case.

Hey @cazjardine,

Sorry for the issues you’re having,

I’ll get Forum Support to reach out, please keep an eye on your private messages. 

You can see the messages on here

https://forum.ovoenergy.com/inbox/overview

Hi.

I would need help to get my account to change DD and make payments. I tried to call or log in from my account, unfortunately the website does not work and it seems that no one answers the phone. It is a problem that is already becoming frustrating for me.

I have -600£ and I can't understand why and from where!

I have NO ONE to talk to about my problem.

If you can help me to talk to someone, I would be very happy!

Thank you.