Unexplained change to direct debits?

Did you compose your long reply in an external editor, then copy it in and post it?

I'm not a moderator here, but where I do mod the automatic filters will often see that as a ‘too fast, may be a spambot’ post and send it to the queue to be approved (or rejected) by a human.

Nope ... even the second short reply, with quotes and less than two lines of input text, was sent to moderation. 

Ah. sorry then but as I am sure wii you understand I don't want to say too much about how forum moderation works (we try not to give the bad guys clues).

LOL - especially as I don't know how it has been set up on this particualr forum or forum software.

 Thanks.
  

Yes, the calculator isn’t much use at that stage. However, I’ve not seen much in the way of complaints about increased DDs on this score. DD reviews are (allegedly) conducted at least quarterly, so any increase in DD that OVO suggests in March, say, could reflect a change in account behaviour since December. 
  
A suggestion or recommendation doesn’t necessarily become a requirement.
  

This again was a frequent grumble last year. If the DD had been set low because of a large credit balance the previous autumn, it would have had to rise from 1 April to the ‘standard’ level of projected annual cost/12. This isn’t totally unreasonable, and OVO would have complied with Ofgem’s and others’ urgings (neither expectations nor requirements) to reduce their holding of customer credit balances.
    

Yes to non-compliance with Ofgem’s expectation, but why should BACS or the bank involved concern themselves with a commercial arrangement in which their only role is as facilitators?

Sorry, but it rank hypocrisy to on the one hand say that the calculator isn’t much use and then go on to defend it because it isn’t always as bad as it could be because the recommendation doesn’t always become a requirement. 

The simple fact of the matter is that the calculator reflects how OVO calculate direct debits … and do in a manner that simply isn’t fit for purpose and doesn’t help to protect customers who aren’t as bright a you think you are. 

It is self-evidently enough of a problem that OVO tried to implement a hopelessly bodged fix by switching to 31st March + 1 year, which is causing this mess  …. and that most definitely is not reducing OVO’s holdings of credit balances. 

I’m not here to justify BACS rules and operating procedures - I am simply stating facts - but you are very much misunderstanding the responsibilities if you think that BACS and the banks are merely “facilitators”. 

OVO’s customers are customers of the banks, banks’ responsibilities are to their customers and banks don’t like dealing with the shit and recharges that result from an incompetent company which isn’t following the BACS rules. Those same banks also make up the majority of the guarantors os PAY.UK (who own and operate BACS) … although Barclays aren’t one of those guarantors and therefore have limited sway over BACS.

Still not a proper answer, @Emmanuelle_OVO.

Anyway, no matter. This incompetence really is the final straw for me and as of today I am delighted to be able to say that I am no longer a customer of OVO and have therefore signed off.

What about those not on fixed tariffs? I understand that this new arrangement applies to them, too. 
  

Unless I’ve misunderstood, there’s no change in the way customers’ future consumption is estimated - it’s still just the FAC each year. Not even OVO can foresee what future consumption might be some time next year, so any ‘better estimate’ made today for the period 1 April 2025 - 31 March 2026 is pure speculation.

With this arrangement, a customer currently in debt would risk having a negative balance for the rest of this winter and the whole of the next. OK, it’s not necessarily ‘building up’, but even so it’s difficult to see how this can be reconciled with the Core Terms’ requirement for Direct Debit customers: “you agree that … you’ll keep your energy account in credit by paying for the supply in advance”.

In an earlier attempt to justify this change, we heard that “This will … improve the experience when customers move between tariffs.” In what way will the experience be better if a customer currently in debt is still in debt at the end of a fixed-price term? The main difference I see is that any attempt to switch supplier at that stage - a common scenario - will now be blocked. That’s hardly a better experience.

Please try and find out the actual reasoning behind this fundamental change.

So the rationale for the change is that it better prepares customers for both this AND next winter. Customers in credit appear to need to pay more so that customers with a debit can spead the payments over a longer period. Has anyone worked out what this means for customers?

So in the following table I have used my monthly charges and calculated the repayments based on a variety of credit/debit balances for 5 month (March 2025), 12 month and 17 month (March 2026) payment periods.

In (almost) every scenario the lowest monthly payment is over 12 months. This reflect what I would actually use over a full 12 month period (£119 per month). The suggestion that by extending the payback period to 17 months eases the payments for customers in debit only works (for me) if I am more than £600 in debit.

When we get to April 2025 will the period then skip to March 2027? Will I always be paying to cover two winters?? Isn't it sensible to stick to a rolling 12 month period where payments should track usage and NOT an estimate of this AND next winter?

That’s an interesting question.

I had assumed that this was a transitional measure and that it would be after March 2026 that it would then revert to 12 months again, ie March 2027.

But nothing that I can find actually says that.