Why has OVO exaggerated my projected usage estimates after I got a new meter?

I, like you, keep my account in an extremely healthy state and put my bonus payments into my account. However, on OVO Energy’s admission, the algorithm has a bug in it as a result of a meter change in November last year. They say that there is no timescale for it to be fixed. The system, therefore, keeps churning out rubbish which it will not let me alter and issuing all kinds of financial penalties.

Certainly, I will never actually pay for any energy I don't use, but because the system is taking more out of my account than it should be (£238/mth instead of £210), my bank account is haemorrhaging money whilst my OVO account is rising to an to unnecessarily high amount of credit.

I do not want a refund. I want to reduce my monthly payments.

I do not intend to involve the Ombudsman at this stage.

I’ve spent some time today attempting to number crunch this manually, but you didn’t mention that you have Economy 7 or what your total Day and Night usage was over the last year. Without this information, I’m afraid I’m unable to punch in more accurate figures into the tools I use and can only go off of a basic single rate tariff. All information in this reply is based on a Unit Rate of 16.83p/kWh Ex. VAT and a Daily Standing Charge of 22.03p/kWh Ex. VAT on the Better Energy tariff that I am currently on, as available when I signed up in September 2020. These figures may vary depending on circumstances. I have not factored in VAT, OVO Beyond, OVO Foundation Donations or anything else beyond the raw rates as stated.

Based on your actual figures of 16,555kWh last year, I make that an average of about 45kWh/Day (rounded down slightly to simplify this breakdown). That works out at an average 1,380kWh/Month, rounded up to the nearest whole number. This also works out as being about an average 1.38mWh/Month. That works out at £2,786.20 a year prior to the Standing Charges which would be another £80.41 for the year. Combined together, I calculate a total of £2,866.61 Ex. VAT for that period. Divide that by 12 and I get £238.88 per month Ex. VAT, but generally this would be rounded up to more like £240 for ease of reference. The VAT on that at a 5% rate works out as being £143.33 for the year making a grand total of £3,009.94 Inc. VAT. That’s also £11.94 a month in VAT which makes for £250.82 a month total Inc. VAT.

However, this is before you factor in any discounts or the split from Economy 7. I cannot calculate these for you as I don’t have the information available. I would suspect your payments were probably about right last year but I cannot guarantee that. 

Having reviewed the information I could gather from you for this year, I calculate that OVO’s algorithms had initially made an additional average allowance of an extra 16kWh/Day on top of your previous figures (making for a “budget” of 62kWh/Day) and 13kWh/Day (making for a “budget” of 59kWh/Day) after the recalculation. This makes sense because your usage is pretty high anyway and what OVO has attempted to do is to give you some leeway in the estimates in order to allow for any fluctuations without affecting your bill. If you still end up only using an average of 45kWh/Day anyway, you will only be billed for the average 45kWh/Day.

Regardless of this, my calculations indicate that a £1,000 balance alone will only get you through 1/3 of the year. In my personal view, it appears that the system is trying to build up a buffer of spare credit over the summer period when your usage is lower to help counteract the winter period and keep your account on track. This is completely normal.

The easiest way to reduce your projected estimates and your bills, is to basically reduce your overall energy usage. Storage Heaters are some of the biggest energy guzzlers out there and are rarely the most cost effective option available. It may be worth considering whether you can upgrade to something more efficient.

It is common for energy suppliers to err on the side of caution and to bias the calculations to be slightly higher than reality in order to allow for various factors, fluctuations and changes in your usage patterns. There are a lot of factors that the system will use when calculating the projections and your current account balance at the time along with your projected account balance are just two of the factors which get fed into the algorithms. No energy supplier worth their salt would fail to factor this stuff in.

If you suspect your meter to be faulty, then a Meter Accuracy Test is an option. If the algorithms OVO uses really are misbehaving, I can assure you that there’s a very, very good chance I would notice that and bug report it almost immediately. To date, I have not needed to do so.

Figures are:  Between 13/5/21 and 13/5/21

Daytime 1676 kWh/annum

Nighttime 9979 kWh/annum

VAT inclusive tariff:

Day 19.78 p/kWh

Night 11.76 p/kWh

Standing Charge 20.75 p/day

Balance at 13/5/21 £922.71

Please do the calculations now.

It seems that 5,000kWh remains unaccounted for and I'm unable to get an accurate figure. Please review your comments in this thread and double check the figures provided.

In addition, are you absolutely sure you used 11mWh in a single day? That's an impossibly high amount that goes far beyond the combined daily usage of the entire block of flats that I live in. 

Even without that, I'm still getting £1,315 total. Assigning the missing 5,000kWh to your Night Rate adds a further £588 making £1,903 but even with this, it doesn't match up to your reported £210 a month payments as it averages out at £158. It's only when I assign the 5,000kWh to your Day rate instead that I actually get more reasonable figures. With that, I get £2,304 a year which averages £192 a month. The additional £20 a month on top makes sense as a safety net.

Maybe you are perhaps using more energy than you expected?

My only other two theories that I can make are that either your old meter was faulty and clocking too slowly, or that you may not have considered the true cost of having storage heaters and you might not be using them properly. They are among the most expensive possible heating systems to run. Economy 7 isn't going to be around forever either, so you should consider that factor as well.

I do apologise for this, but I can't help you out if you don't provide the correct information. 

I quote: “It seems that 5,000kWh remains unaccounted for.” That is the basis of my complaint. The EAC generated by the system is wrong as confirmed by Customer Services.

I quote: “I do apologise for this, but I can't help you out if you don't provide the correct information.” My figures are correct as confirmed by Complaints department.

Where does 11 MWhr come from?

I quote: “Economy 7 isn't going to be around forever.” Neither am I. It is unlikely that any savings I might make would offset the capital cost in my lifetime.

The missing 5,000 I referenced is actually a discrepancy in the actual usage figures you provided me with, which seems to change with each comment. I can't run the numbers when this happens.

I think the best thing you can probably do for now is wait for OVO to re-bill your account after the team goes back through and recalculates everything. As previously advised, the Support Team can manually override the system and force your payments down to below the minimum amount that the system is allowing you to request. At the same time you request that, you can also request a refund of some of the spare credit.

Apologies. Daytime usage should read 6576 kWh/annum.

Thanks for the confirmation.

In that case, I make it £2,550 per year or £212.50 a month. However, there is usually a safety net added on top which I think is about 10% or so of the projected estimates. In your case, this would more or less account for the full £238. This helps to ensure that there is a little bit of tolerance in case things don't quite work out as expected. 

Based on that, I certainly agree that £250 a month was probably a bit excessive, but the updated projections do appear to be reasonable now. If you end up using less, then it will probably drop at the next check-in. I recommend letting the account run on autopilot but continue to submit regular meter readings as before. The more the algorithm learns about your account, the smarter it will get. It just takes a while sometimes. 

You have taken no account of the credit in my account. This should reduce the direct debit amount by approximately £75/month. 

I have shown that I used 16555 kWh between 13/5/20 and 13/5/21. Why then does ‘my plan details’ on my online account now say 21535 kWh, some 30% greater?

Why is the algorithm taking so long? I have submitted meter readings regularly on the 13th of each month for the last two and a quarter years.

How I use the electricity I pay for is of no business of OVO.

I'm afraid I don't have psychic powers and it's not possible for me to run manual calculations that factor in non-public information without the ability to access your account and use restricted tools. Forum volunteers can't touch that stuff. I also can't review anything about your account specifically and this does sound like an account specific issue.

My best guess is that your account might be in a Billing Suspension right now, which blocks a lot of stuff including automatically adjusting your payments. You'll probably have to wait for that to be lifted before you can make full use of the system. There's nothing I can do to speed that up. Please be patient.

Realistically speaking, it's probably going to take more than one reading per month to get things back on track. You may wish to consider either submitting readings more often or getting a smart meter installed and have it set to at least daily mode.

In the meantime, I'm afraid you have exhausted the ability for this forum to assist you with this issue and unfortunately I will no longer be involved with your threads. Other volunteers may still be willing to assist at their discretion.

Farewell. 

I’m really sorry to hear your issues are as yet unresolved, @martinkressman.

If your complaint is now escalated to our Complaints team they will advise you on the next steps and timeframes. If we’re not able to resolve things within 8 weeks you can take this to the Energy Ombudsman for independent review. See a full breakdown of this process here.

Hoping we can reach a resolution for you soon.

I am still waiting.

I’ve just had my account moved from SSE to OVO (not my choice) and logging into the App for the first time it shows my projected monthly payment needs to be circa. £1100 PER MONTH??? If this is accurate then we will not be able to afford to remain and will need to request Gas and Electricity be cut off.
The wait time on chat is currently 476 minutes, so that’s awesome too!! How can I resolve this quickly as the thought is taking years off me.

Smart meter BTW

Hi @ShepDog,

I’m sorry for the issues you’ve been having.

As we don’t have access to your account I can only speculate as to what might have happened here. 

I’d first check your first bill and opening meter readings.

If it’s not a case of your first bill being incorrect, it may be that your estimated annual consumption is incorrect. As you have a smart meter this should be rectified as your readings start coming through. 

You can check we are in communication with your smart meters online:

• Identifying Smart Meter Issues on your online account or OVO app Tutorial

If you are having issues getting through to the Support Team on the phone you can contact them through web messenger.

I hope this helps. 

Yes yet again OVO are increasing the Estimated Annual Usage figures they use for calculating Direct Debits.  Basically if users pay these increased demands for payments OVO have loads of cash on 10% + overnight interest, what a scam.

Do not contact support they have no idea about Annual Usage and have means to change.

Go to Trust Pilot and write a 1* review about how shoddy the transition from SSE is and they will contact you.

I had to do this myself as they tried to use this extortion tactic to double my DD, which has now been manually set so it is not auto-generated.  I have been with OVO now some 3 months and despite having a Smart Reader it is only recently that the consumption shown in the APP makes sense.   Beggars belief that after 3 years OVO can not offer a smooth transition.

Thanks SpyderDor