Rank 1

Solved

Why do my online usage graphs show I was using energy during a power cut?

Forum|Forum|4 years ago
February 11, 2022
25 replies
1270 views

I noticed that I was charged electricity during the 5 days outage as the smart meter sent the same data daily as the last day we had power, so I ended up paying almost £2 a day for a service I did not receive, SSE paid compensation for the inconvenience, and the girl I spoke to seemed to indicate that the compensation also included and payment we would have made for electricity not supplied - this seems wrong and separate issues as this means folks with smart meters paid a daily rate for the electricity they did not receive and those without smart meters didn’t.

seems wrong - OVO must have received tens of thousands from lots of customers for a service not provided - I want to take this up with Ofgem and it is not a fair practice

Best answer by Blastoise186

Updated on 18/09/23 by Abby_OVO

Hi @paulbrash .

Was this on OVO’s side or SSE’s side of things? Your post isn’t quite clear so I’ll have to assume it could be either one for now.

If you’re purely looking at the usage data, please bear in mind that this is only a guide and is not used for billing purposes - only the actual meter readings are taken into account. If your meter isn’t spinning at all on a particular day due to an outage, the only charges you’ll rack up (at most) would be the Daily Standing Charges, but the Usage Charges for that day should be zero. MyOVO will sometimes try to estimate usage for any day where it doesn’t have usage data available, but it will correct itself for the billing purposes once the next actual meter reading comes in - and this can automatically wipe out any overcharges caused by the estimates. This rule is the same regardless of what kind of meter you’ve got.

I should probably also mention that while OVO might have some of your cash in the bank, they cannot do anything with it until you’ve actually spent it and this only happens after a bill is generated. Any and all spare credit has to be ringfenced and the only thing OVO can do with it in the meantime is simply keep it safe and either withdraw what you’ve actually spent and throw that into the main accounts, or send it back to you if you ask for a refund. Otherwise it just sits there waiting for something to happen. This isn’t profit per se, because OVO cannot readily use it for any other purpose.

Of course, if the billing does get out of line due to an outage like this, OVO and SSE will indeed be happy to issue refunds if needed. But please bear in mind that the usage graphs alone for any supplier, your In-Home Display and any apps/web dashboards should not be relied upon for billing purposes. It’s all about the meter readings.

If you’re still unhappy, you cannot go to Ofgem about this as your complaint will bounce back. Please follow the complaints processes for OVO/SSE depending on which side you’re on and if you still can’t resolve it you’ll want to go to the Energy Ombudsman rather than Ofgem.

Blastoise186

Solved

Super User

Updated on 18/09/23 by Abby_OVO

Hi @paulbrash .

Was this on OVO’s side or SSE’s side of things? Your post isn’t quite clear so I’ll have to assume it could be either one for now.

If you’re purely looking at the usage data, please bear in mind that this is only a guide and is not used for billing purposes - only the actual meter readings are taken into account. If your meter isn’t spinning at all on a particular day due to an outage, the only charges you’ll rack up (at most) would be the Daily Standing Charges, but the Usage Charges for that day should be zero. MyOVO will sometimes try to estimate usage for any day where it doesn’t have usage data available, but it will correct itself for the billing purposes once the next actual meter reading comes in - and this can automatically wipe out any overcharges caused by the estimates. This rule is the same regardless of what kind of meter you’ve got.

I should probably also mention that while OVO might have some of your cash in the bank, they cannot do anything with it until you’ve actually spent it and this only happens after a bill is generated. Any and all spare credit has to be ringfenced and the only thing OVO can do with it in the meantime is simply keep it safe and either withdraw what you’ve actually spent and throw that into the main accounts, or send it back to you if you ask for a refund. Otherwise it just sits there waiting for something to happen. This isn’t profit per se, because OVO cannot readily use it for any other purpose.

Of course, if the billing does get out of line due to an outage like this, OVO and SSE will indeed be happy to issue refunds if needed. But please bear in mind that the usage graphs alone for any supplier, your In-Home Display and any apps/web dashboards should not be relied upon for billing purposes. It’s all about the meter readings.

If you’re still unhappy, you cannot go to Ofgem about this as your complaint will bounce back. Please follow the complaints processes for OVO/SSE depending on which side you’re on and if you still can’t resolve it you’ll want to go to the Energy Ombudsman rather than Ofgem.

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!

P

paulbrashAuthor

Rank 1

It is OVO and I assure you I have been charged

P

paulbrashAuthor

Rank 1

Whilst I am not concerned about the few pounds I want clarity and I mean energy ombudsman rather than ofgem

Blastoise186

Super User

Actually, that’s just your usage graph that you’re seeing there. It’s only a guide and is not something that’s linked to the actual bill. As mentioned, the graph uses estimates for any day where it didn’t have any data. The system doesn’t know why the data didn’t come in and it can’t know that you had a power outage, so it just gave you its best guess on those graphs. To verify how much you actually used and were actually charged, please refer to the bill for that month. You’ll probably find it’s a little bit lower than what the graph says.

It looks like you’re on iPadOS, so if you grab the OVO Energy app for iOS (which does also work on iPadOS) you can use that to check your actual meter readings under Account > Meter Readings. If there’s none for the days of the outage, or there are but they all stayed the same, that will help to prove you’ve not been charged.

This sounds like an account specific issue though, so I’m unable to do anything to adjust the figures or regenerate your bills.

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!

C

carla.mark

Newcomer

Why was my usage no different even tho I was away for 2 days? Unplugged all unnecessary appliances and only had boiler on for one hour on timer per day. Usage was even more on one day than when I was in the house?

juliamc

Rank 20

Do you have a smart meter giving half hour or daily readings? Any less than that would mean your usage figure is averaged out across the days between readings