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Force charge and Octopus rates

Posted: Wed Nov 12, 2025 11:21 pm
by andy@2610.co.uk
Sorry, another question.

I might have misunderstood how Octopus works.

I've been watching activity for a few days and, yesterday, I created a NodeRed flow in Home Assistant to watch the Octopus price. If my car is plugged in and charging, I see the rate in HA drop to 7p. That triggers a call to switch my work mode to force charge.

That looks like it's working.

But when I checked Octopus for yesterday, my bill was £12 instead of about £2. For the periods where Home Assistant was telling me that my rate was 7p, I've been charged peak rate.

If anyone has any idea on why this is, I'd be grateful.

Cheers
Andy

Re: Force charge and Octopus rates

Posted: Thu Nov 13, 2025 8:20 am
by Dave Foster
Not sure whether this is the case here but the Octopus app tells you your cost is one thing but they do all the clever reconciliation when your bill is produced (same for saver sessions). I don’t like it either because it means you’re never sure what your real time use is, but i’ve checked it over and over again and it’s always been correct on the bill.

Re: Force charge and Octopus rates

Posted: Thu Nov 13, 2025 9:54 am
by Will
The octopus costs are only an estimate, and as the meter data comes in, the true cost updates. Check the cost of last night in a couple of days and you'll see it's correct.