GETTING paid to use electricity? It sounds like a dream – especially in today’s economic climate.
But canny consumers who use Octopus Energy’s Agile tariff are wide awake to the joy of turning power into pounds.
Self-confessed penny pincher Adam Morgan from Canterbury in Kent has been on the Agile Octopus tariff for three years.
“I’ll be honest: I’m tight. If I think I can get a good deal, I’m in there – and with Octopus I’m quids in,” says Adam, 59, who works in supply chain transformation.
“My average price for electricity over the past two years has been 8p per kilowatt-hour. I defy anyone to find cheaper.”
So how does the Agile Octopus tariff work? Well, the rates it offers customers are connected to the wholesale price of electricity.
When the grid is full of green energy, provided by solar and wind power, wholesale energy prices can drop dramatically – sometimes by so much that customers are paid to take that energy off the grid’s hands.
Those magical moments are dubbed Price Plunges, and Adam gets a real kick out of them.
“I’m always checking the long-term weather forecast,” Adam says. “If there are sunny, windy days ahead, they’re a good bet for electricity prices to drop below zero.
“I have to stop myself becoming a total geek over it but the Price Plunge alerts are exciting.
“With Agile Octopus, we find out our electricity prices for the next day at 4pm. If prices are going to be higher, my wife Keira and I charge our electric cars overnight.
“If prices are going to be lower, I joke with colleagues about coming round to charge their cars using the lovely cheap electricity.
“At first, I was a bit worried on days when electricity is more expensive, but Octopus guarantees customers it will never cost more than £1 per kilowatt-hour. You have to trust the process. And, three years in, every month I’ve come out on top.”
So how can you become an Agile Octopus customer?
The first step is to have a smart meter installed by Octopus free of charge. Then, like Adam, you can look forward to receiving your electricity bill every month.
“I get a summary of my spend and a 30-page bill, breaking down the tariffs for every day of the month. I enjoy reading it,” Adam says with a laugh.
“Last month, with the Price Plunges, our bill was £13. I do get a thrill thinking I’m doing better than everyone else.
“My friend – who’s also an Agile Octopus customer – and I get quite competitive over our savings.
“But there’s a serious side too. With Agile I’m invested in how and when I use electricity and that’s helping our national network become more sustainable.
“So I’m saving my pennies and the planet!”
Adam has converted his daughter Bethan to Agile Octopus too.
“Bethan and her husband recently bought their first house together and I told them to move to Octopus,” he says.
“Octopus gave me a freebie for that.
“Now they’ve had a heat pump installed with Octopus. Bethan’s my guinea pig on that – if the heat pump saves her more money, I’ll get one too.”
Baby, you can charge my car
Va-va-voom: entrepreneur Dylan Watkins has been on the Intelligent Octopus Go tariff – which is exclusively for people who drive electric vehicles – for two years and is saving thousands of pounds.
“Running my Tesla is costing me – I’ve done the maths – the equivalent of 371 miles per gallon,” Dylan says.
“That’s unbelievable value. The really intelligent part of the Go tariff is that I’ve linked it to talk to my car.
“‘We’ve got some cheap electricity for you,’ it says. And my car replies: ‘Yes please – charge me up!’”
Dylan, 52, from Melksham in Wiltshire, is a man who knows a good deal when he spots one.
When he launched his raw dog food company Poppy’s Picnic, he and the eponymous Poppy, a miniature schnauzer, appeared on Dragon’s Den. But despite an offer from Deborah Meaden, Dylan realised crowdfunding was a better option and smashed his target to raise more than £400,000.
“When I was a kid, I’d read my Nan’s Which? magazine cover to cover so I’m pretty astute about finding the best deals,” Dylan says.
He isn’t alone in deciding Intelligent Octopus Go is a winner – it’s the UK’s most popular EV tariff, automatically charging customers’ cars when energy is cheapest – and providing six hours of low-cost energy for their homes every night.
Dylan and his partner Michael capitalise on the overnight home tariff by charging their storage batteries while they sleep in the six hours that the tariff allows.
They can then live off that power during the day, when electricity would otherwise be more expensive.
“Our electricity bill used to be £600 a month – now it’s £150,” Dylan says.
“Octopus has saved us huge amounts of money, which we’ve used to build a lovely greenhouse in our garden.”
Ker-ching! But, more than that, Dylan says that Octopus makes energy fun.
“Remember those boring bills that used to come in brown envelopes every month? This is a whole new world,” he says.
“The Octopus app is so user-friendly. I can track my electricity use on it and often on a Friday I’ll get a message saying: ‘Happy hour on Sunday: all electricity is free.’
“It’s a bit barmy but I’m not complaining. Octopus does things differently – and it works.”
Do you want to be drawn into Octopus’s eight-armed embrace and make huge savings like Adam and Dylan? Feel the Octo-love at octopus.energy
