Octopus, the UK’s largest energy company, has forged an almost unique position for EV drivers with its off-peak and dynamic electricity tariffs. With its Go and Intelligent Octopus Go tariffs, Octopus has rapidly gained market share and earned plenty of fans among EV drivers wanting to reduce their running costs.
But now Octopus is changing the way its Intelligent Go tariff works and some EV drivers aren’t happy. So what changes are they making and how might they affect you?
How did Intelligent Octopus Go originally work?
You can read a full explanation of how dynamic energy tariffs work here, but essentially the crucial difference is in the word ‘dynamic’. A fixed tariff such as Octopus Go has pre-set hours that don’t, but a dynamic tariff such as Intelligent Octopus Go works slightly differently.
Instead, Intelligent gave drivers six guaranteed pre-set hours for low cost electricity from 23.30 until 05.30 for both EV charging and your home, but also gave the option of additional hours as and when there was oversupply and low demand on the grid.
With a dynamic home EV charger such as those from Ohme, this meant an EV requiring a pre-set level of charge could start charging outside those hours during the day, but still at the low cost rate. And remember any of those times that saw lost charging also meant low cost electricity for your home.
Why is Octopus changing how the Intelligent tariff works?
As popular as Intelligent Octopus Go was, there was a small minority taking advantage of a loophole to permanently provide low cost energy at all times.
So that meant low rates for charging 24 hours a day rather than just those pre-set hours plus optimal times during the day. The reality is that six hours of cheap EV charging on a standard single-phase home charger gives just over 44kWh each day which is plenty for most drivers.
So it would only be those high mileage drivers with large battery EVs who even regularly needed any additional hours. The suspicion was that those taking advantage were doing so for home battery storage or other especially power-hungry household items.
Either way, Octopus was keen to cut down on those taking advantage of the tariff’s flexibility, hence these latest changes.
How is Octopus changing the Intelligent Go tariff?
Here is where it gets a little complicated, so bear with us. To best understand the changes to Intelligent Octopus Go, we’re going to split the electricity to your home and your EV charger. So first, with regards to your home’s electricity, the existing six hours of low-cost electricity between 23.30 and 05.30 remain the same as before.
The biggest change however comes with your EV charging. Octopus will now restrict your home charger to just six hours of low cost smart charging in every 24-hour period renewing at midday each day.
Those low cost six hours can be fully in, fully out or part in/out of that original six hour window just mentioned, but that will be the limit of your low cost charging. Any additional hours above those six hours from midday to midday spent charging your car will be charged at the higher rate for the tariff (sometimes referred to as the ‘bump rate’).
So the latest changes to the Intelligent Go tariff mean that drivers still get six hours of cheap charging but are losing the ability to have those hours guaranteed overnight and are also losing those extra flexible hours on top of those original six hours. It would be easy to blame Octopus for the change, but in reality they had to prevent those drivers continuing to take advantage of the tariff’s flexibility.
So, for a full 0-100% charge of our Polestar 2 that could be the difference between £5.74 at 7p/kWh and £22.96 (at a bump rate of 28p/kWh), but that’s a very unlikely scenario. Even for high mileage drivers, the amount of times that they are likely to need to charge for any length of time at the bump rate is likely to be minimal.
And, while drivers may be frustrated at losing the ability to charge at 7p/kWh for that additional time above six hours each day, the reality is that with more gular plugging-in and constant top-ups, that could be easily avoided. In our Polestar 2, that 44kWh of cheap charging on a daily basis is the equivalent of 130-150 miles every day. When the average UK daily mileage is around 30 miles, that should be plenty.
So should you switch tariffs?
As with any of your home bills, you should always be on top of shopping around and ensuring that you’re getting the best possible price that you can.
However, having said that, Intelligent Octopus Go remains one of the lowest EV tariffs on the market, so it’s unlikely that you’ll actually benefit from a switch. Our recommendation would be to wait until the changes have been in place for a few months and then see how much of your charging has actually been at the bump rate. As outlined above, the chances are it’s likely to be little to none.