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

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BPLightlog
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I was told that I would continue to be sent my bills - and a few days later I had an email with my bill.  Unfortunately the bill was accessed via a link in the email - and guess what - I ended up back in the “no website untl Christmas” page.

 

There is no way that I am phoning them and hanging on for ages.

But my current monthly payment is well below my current bills and I have been making top up payments each month. Tis is done via the website - so I won’t be able to top up until Christmas!

 

I presume you’ve tried this link to log in? https://www.ovoenergy.com/

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P
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Of course I have tried that link. 

More times that I can remember.

I am now going to shut up about this because it is clear that OVO has tin ears and doesn’t care.

When will they send the debt collectors in?

Will they wait until Christmas?

and to be honest I don’t believe the line that it is only 2% that haven’t been transferred to the new system. That is just not how things like this work - or should work

BPLightlog
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Of course I have tried that link. 

More times that I can remember.

I am now going to shut up about this because it is clear that OVO has tin ears and doesn’t care.

When will they send the debt collectors in?

Will they wait until Christmas?

and to be honest I don’t believe the line that it is only 2% that haven’t been transferred to the new system. That is just not how things like this work - or should work

Sorry but you didn’t answer previously. You do know of course that this isn’t a direct channel to OVO. No one here has access to your account and most members are other customers like you

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A
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Some further info, in case it helps someone from OVO to explain what’s going on (or for the benefit of other readers).

I was a customer of OVO from about 2015 to 2020, when I switched to Southend Energy (run, so I thought, by my local authority - but actually operated by Robin Hood Energy). When that company folded I accepted a switch to British Gas. While with OVO I had Secure Liberty 100 smart meters fitted, and these worked perfectly well, as they did during my time with Southend Energy. Sadly British Gas had intermittent problems accessing them (despite their reassurances that the matter would be resolved ‘soon’). Similarly, their online portal was ‘being migrated – but you won’t have any issues’, but nonetheless did not enable me to access the smart meter readings – indeed it seemed they only polled the meters when it was time to generate a bill.

That’s what caused me to return to OVO. Having signed up by phone the initial contact was an email confirming direct debit details – I’m still waiting for formal written confirmation of the account. I followed the link on OVO’s website [https://www.ovoenergy.com/help/my-account] to set up an online account. When I tried to login to https://my.ovoenergy.com/login I got a screen with the pre-populated fields: OVO id containing 100904836, and a hidden saved password, above a green ‘Log on’ button. That’s what links to a webpage advising that a new website is under construction but won’t be actually available until the end of 2023.

Following the reply from ‘jeffus’ I tried the link to https://www.ovoenergy.com/ and clicked the login button. The same saved details appeared but when I deleted them and entered my email address and the password I’d set up earlier I was correctly connected to my own new account, where I could submit the changeover readings.

So I now wonder if the OVO id ‘100904836’ relates to my previous account, which clearly would have been linked to the earlier billing system. But if that’s so, where were my previous login details stored? It turns out that they’re in my Google password store! (Now deleted)

But in my ‘real’ online account it’s apparently not possible to show me ‘My energy usage’ nor my smart meter readings, although my Pipit IHD seems to be working and shows the correct tariff details. How do I check if the WAN side of the smart metering is working correctly? The signal strength indicator shows five flashes, which I take to mean there’s no problem there, so why can’t OVO get readings from the meters? And if OVO can’t read the meters how can it advise what my balance today is?

(If this last aspect belongs to another thread, could someone move it?)

BPLightlog
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Some further info, in case it helps someone from OVO to explain what’s going on (or for the benefit of other readers).

I was a customer of OVO from about 2015 to 2020, when I switched to Southend Energy (run, so I thought, by my local authority - but actually operated by Robin Hood Energy). When that company folded I accepted a switch to British Gas. While with OVO I had Secure Liberty 100 smart meters fitted, and these worked perfectly well, as they did during my time with Southend Energy. Sadly British Gas had intermittent problems accessing them (despite their reassurances that the matter would be resolved ‘soon’). Similarly, their online portal was ‘being migrated – but you won’t have any issues’, but nonetheless did not enable me to access the smart meter readings – indeed it seemed they only polled the meters when it was time to generate a bill.

That’s what caused me to return to OVO. Having signed up by phone the initial contact was an email confirming direct debit details – I’m still waiting for formal written confirmation of the account. I followed the link on OVO’s website [https://www.ovoenergy.com/help/my-account] to set up an online account. When I tried to login to https://my.ovoenergy.com/login I got a screen with the pre-populated fields: OVO id containing 100904836, and a hidden saved password, above a green ‘Log on’ button. That’s what links to a webpage advising that a new website is under construction but won’t be actually available until the end of 2023.

Following the reply from ‘jeffus’ I tried the link to https://www.ovoenergy.com/ and clicked the login button. The same saved details appeared but when I deleted them and entered my email address and the password I’d set up earlier I was correctly connected to my own new account, where I could submit the changeover readings.

So I now wonder if the OVO id ‘100904836’ relates to my previous account, which clearly would have been linked to the earlier billing system. But if that’s so, where were my previous login details stored? It turns out that they’re in my Google password store! (Now deleted)

But in my ‘real’ online account it’s apparently not possible to show me ‘My energy usage’ nor my smart meter readings, although my Pipit IHD seems to be working and shows the correct tariff details. How do I check if the WAN side of the smart metering is working correctly? The signal strength indicator shows five flashes, which I take to mean there’s no problem there, so why can’t OVO get readings from the meters? And if OVO can’t read the meters how can it advise what my balance today is?

(If this last aspect belongs to another thread, could someone move it?)

Unfortunately even if you’ve been a customer before it takes a while for the meters to sync and provide readings. It is quite possible that estimates are being used until then unless you enter them yourself as manual readings. 
From memory I think the flashes you describe are correct but I’m sure someone will confirm. 
Your IHD uses a local connection to your meters and so is not an indication of good comms to the main data hub

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Emmanuelle_OVO
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Hey @p47rick and anyone else who has been sent a link to their statements without a pdf attached to their email.

 

Please can you send me a private message with your name, address and OVO account number, I’ll raise this internally and see if the pdf’s of your statements can be emailed to you.

 

Please do not post your account details on this thread, it’s a public Forum. 

Renewable Energy? Big Fan.
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Hey @p47rick and anyone else who has been sent a link to their statements without a pdf attached to their email.

 

Please can you send me a private message with your name, address and OVO account number, I’ll raise this internally and see if the pdf’s of your statements can be emailed to you.

 

Please do not post your account details on this thread, it’s a public Forum. 

I’ve just experienced the same.  Is there any new info on this situation? It’s shockingly bad. I’m curious, is it only people without smart meters being delayed? 

1
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I was told that I would continue to be sent my bills - and a few days later I had an email with my bill.  Unfortunately the bill was accessed via a link in the email - and guess what - I ended up back in the “no website untl Christmas” page.

 

There is no way that I am phoning them and hanging on for ages.

But my current monthly payment is well below my current bills and I have been making top up payments each month. Tis is done via the website - so I won’t be able to top up until Christmas!

 

Hi, I was just wondering if you’ve had any further info about this? I’m one of the 2% apparently.  I don’t have a smart meter, could that be why? 

Blastoise186
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Everyone who is currently on the legacy Apollo billing system is being migrated, smart meters or not. How quickly you migrate is also not (to my knowledge) based on whether you have smart meters or not.

From now on however, no-one will be set up on Apollo, nor migrated back to Apollo even on request. It’s closing down because it proved too troublesome and the new billing platform fixes the many issues that OVO found with it. The new one has been road tested for a few years now and overall is way better. If you find bugs in it, OVO will definitely be happy to accept bug reports as it’s built by their sister company Kaluza (the old one is third-party).

The accounts that are most likely to be migrated quickly are the easy ones where there’s nothing unusual and are fully supported by the new system already. I’m told that over 99% of those accounts have already migrated anyway so chances are most of the ones left are more complicated and need extra attention.

Securing energy by zapping security bugs... For that is The Blastoise Way!
P
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I was told that I would continue to be sent my bills - and a few days later I had an email with my bill.  Unfortunately the bill was accessed via a link in the email - and guess what - I ended up back in the “no website untl Christmas” page.

 

There is no way that I am phoning them and hanging on for ages.

But my current monthly payment is well below my current bills and I have been making top up payments each month. Tis is done via the website - so I won’t be able to top up until Christmas!

 

Hi, I was just wondering if you’ve had any further info about this? I’m one of the 2% apparently.  I don’t have a smart meter, could that be why? 

I had a private message from Emanuelle - see above - and I have given them the info they asked for. I have jsut heard that I will get another email with a pdf of my bill.
But this will obviously have estimated readings - which are usually out.
So I will use my readings to calculate what I owe and pay them that.

It is ridiculous that a big company is so rubbish at dealing with customers

Maybe it is a conspiracy to force us to have smart meters?

Blastoise186
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If you Pay On-Demand, you need to pay what’s stated on the bill, otherwise you risk triggering debt collection. Estimated readings will get fixed the next time you submit an actual reading which you can do over the phone or live chat. If doing so results in your account going into credit, you’ll see it applied to the next bill.

If it’s been a while since you last put in an actual reading, I’d definitely recommend submitting one sooner rather than later.

This isn’t a conspiracy or anything. Just a very long term plan to shut down an old billing system that that OVO don’t want to use anymore.

Securing energy by zapping security bugs... For that is The Blastoise Way!
P
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If you Pay On-Demand, you need to pay what’s stated on the bill, otherwise you risk triggering debt collection. Estimated readings will get fixed the next time you submit an actual reading which you can do over the phone or live chat.

This isn’t a conspiracy or anything. Just a very long term plan to shut down an old billing system that that OVO don’t want to use anymore.

and the next time I can submit actual readings is looking like Christmas!!

I can deal with debt collectors when I do not owe anything.

Oh and live chat?  That seems to be hiding somewhere.

Blastoise186
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https://help.ovoenergy.com 

Works for me. But it only shows up during service hours.

 

Securing energy by zapping security bugs... For that is The Blastoise Way!
1
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I was told that I would continue to be sent my bills - and a few days later I had an email with my bill.  Unfortunately the bill was accessed via a link in the email - and guess what - I ended up back in the “no website untl Christmas” page.

 

There is no way that I am phoning them and hanging on for ages.

But my current monthly payment is well below my current bills and I have been making top up payments each month. Tis is done via the website - so I won’t be able to top up until Christmas!

 

You could use the webchat option then screenshot the transcript for you records.

Blastoise186
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Actually, provided you don’t use Incognito mode or wipe the cookie out, OVO’s live chat tool will retain the chat history for you so you can see it later

Securing energy by zapping security bugs... For that is The Blastoise Way!
1
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Actually, provided you don’t use Incognito mode or wipe the cookie out, OVO’s live chat tool will retain the chat history for you so you can see it later

Thank you but I’m afraid that doesn’t work, in my case.  I don’t use incognito mode nor have I deleted my cookie history and the chat history is not available.  In theory, a request can be made for a transcript of the webchat but in reality, you don’t get them.  In fact, the advice from the webchat advisors is to screenshot the webchat.

 

J
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I can’t log in any longer to my online dashboard account. The app is also not working. It says it will take until the end of the YEAR for this to be reinstated. So now I have an online account that doesn’t function online at all? What? 

BPLightlog
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Not sure where you generally log in @Jam but there have been a few mentions of this. Have you tried https://www.ovoenergy.com/ and log in there? It seems to get back online for some 

Independent volunteer - Sitting in a Faraday cage, waiting for a signal
J
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I tried logging in there. All I get is :

We’re working on a new website for you

We're in the process of migrating groups of customers to our new website so access to your online account won't be available until the end of 2023.
You’ll continue to receive your bill every month by email and we’ve explained how you can pay it and get copies of your current and historic statements below.

 

The link from there to this forum is broken too. 

My phone app is also suspended. 

This topic was red hot on this forum this morning but I can’t find a trace of it now. What on earth is going on?

Blastoise186
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It’s being replaced by a new system. You’re still on the old one.

OVO will keep you posted.

As for the forum link? Leave that with me. I think I can diagnose it and get it flagged up to fix.

Securing energy by zapping security bugs... For that is The Blastoise Way!
J
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Haha! Ovo have said it will take until the end of 2023. Time to vote with my feet and move on me thinks.

 

Blastoise186
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It might not take that long. Be patient.

Securing energy by zapping security bugs... For that is The Blastoise Way!
J
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What's the inside story then? That’s what they’ve announced!

 

J
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Having an online account where you can’t access your direct debit, historic bills, meter readings et al is just terrible! No announcement via email up front. Just suspension for 8 months.  This forum was red hot on this topic this morning and I came back to find some links to see if there was any update but it seems to have been wiped. I can’t find it anywhere? 

Blastoise186
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I’ll see if it still exists.

You’re being moved to the new billing platform. Most people already got moved and there’s just a small number left to do. OVO will keep you posted and you can still use Live Chat to access all that stuff in the meantime.

Securing energy by zapping security bugs... For that is The Blastoise Way!

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