Ohme Charging

[tsedge]

Oh dear .... How are Octopus supposed to Intelligently map a charge session at the best times to help balance the grid etc. if you ask for 80% of your battery capacity when you only require 5%?

It is fundamental to how IOG works that you set to a reasonable degree of accuracy how much charge you actually require.

We have discussed this before but I think it is inevitable that many people (probably the majority) will "set and forget" a high enough percentage with these systems, as I do. It just isn't realistic to expect it to be adjusted every time the car is put on charge, it is human nature to seek the quickest solution.

If it were a significant problem something would be done about it, but month after month nothing has happened.

 

[Rolfe]

They could make the app default to 10% rather than to the last % you asked for, but that might just piss people off, and there's still no guarantee they'd enter the % they really need.

 

[CharlesCarmichael]

I set mine to the charge i need, although only had it a week, it only takes a few seconds.

As more cars become smarter in talking to the charger there won't be a need to set a charge level. My ID4 talks to the OHME charger so they both work out how much is needed and set accordingly.

 

[crowe99]

Oh dear .... How are Octopus supposed to Intelligently map a charge session at the best times to help balance the grid etc. if you ask for 80% of your battery capacity when you only require 5%?

It is fundamental to how IOG works that you set to a reasonable degree of accuracy how much charge you actually require.

I think my small amount of charge is unlikely to impact the grid to be honest and the balancing is likely to be related to what people actually use, not what chargers (or people) say they will use.

If there's a better way than editing every single time I want to plug in my car then great, but I am not aware of one and with the flaky MG at one end and slightly less flaky Ohme at the other, I have to adopt a "if it ain't broke, don't fix it approach".

The laughable thing is that I set it to 40% twice and it reset back to 80% so maybe it's user error but that is why it is so high.

 

[tonybridge]

Forget the car in this equation... just open the Ohme app, work out how much percent you need to add to what you already have in the battery to reach your desired target, and leave the charger to work everything out. So, you have 20% in the car's battery, you want to end up with 80% SOC at 8:30 in the morning - just set your charger, via the app, to add 60% by 8:30, and go to bed.

It really couldn't be simpler. User error is highly likely.

 

[Rolfe]

I find that Octopus usually over-estimates the time my car needs to add the requested % to the battery. There's also the question of the slots generally being half-hours. If Octopus thinks your car needs an extra slot to get from 78% to 80%, and if you haven't done anything else to stop it then I think it will go right on charging to the end of the slot.

If you have an NMC battery and you don't want it to go beyond 80%, I think you have to set the 80% limit in the car so it will actually stop there.

 

[tonybridge]

I find that Octopus usually over-estimates the time my car needs to add the requested % to the battery. There's also the question of the slots generally being half-hours. If Octopus thinks your car needs an extra slot to get from 78% to 80%, and if you haven't done anything else to stop it then I think it will go right on charging to the end of the slot.

If you have an NMC battery and you don't want it to go beyond 80%, I think you have to set the 80% limit in the car so it will actually stop there.

Why not just set the charger to add 70%? I don't get why people stress so much about numbers...

 

[Rolfe]

I don't know. I don't have an NMC battery. I just want Octopus to shove as much charge into my car as it will take without actually being sick. But I'm pretty sure there's a work-round somewhere. I certainly don't find it a chore just to check the SoC before I get out of the car and then work out how much less than 100% that is. Or even just get my phone out and do it before I get out of the car.

But surely that's what the "health mode" setting is for, so that NMC owners can tell the car not to go over 80% no matter what the charger is trying to do?

 

[crowe99]

Why not just set the charger to add 70%? I don't get why people stress so much about numbers...

Do you leave the car limit set at 100% out of interest and just use the Ohme amount to add out of interest?

 

[tonybridge]

Do you leave the car limit set at 100% out of interest and just use the Ohme amount to add out of interest?

I’ve never changed anything on the car, I have no idea what the settings are. Following all the advice on the Ohme app and website, I only use the app. I recommend looking at the Facebook group https://m.facebook.com/groups/971886316643042/?ref=share There’s lots of very useful info there (look in ‘Files’, and ‘Featured’), and if everybody digested this info, there wouldn’t be so many posts about how to charge an EV with a home charger.

 

[Griffian]

I’ve never changed anything on the car, I have no idea what the settings are. Following all the advice on the Ohme app and website, I only use the app. I recommend looking at the Facebook group https://m.facebook.com/groups/971886316643042/?ref=share There’s lots of very useful info there (look in ‘Files’, and ‘Featured’), and if everybody digested this info, there wouldn’t be so many posts about how to charge an EV with a home charger.

Me too. I do exactly the same. The Ohme does it all. Nothing set in vehicle.

 

[Koomi]

I have changed from IOG to Agile, and this relies on setting desired charge % AND/OR a price cap, but works out well.
If I was to require 40% charge to take me from 40% to 80% before 6am tomorrow... and the price range is 1p-15p I would want my 40% coming from the lowest priced time slots.

Setting and forgetting at +90% would use what it thought was required to get 90% charge and eat into the 15p slots.
Asking for 40% would work out what was needed, and then feed from the 1p-5p cheaper hours.

Being on IOG it was easier to set and forget, as if all else fails, it will charge between 1130-0530 at the 7p anyway

 

[andyvee]

Being on IOG it was easier to set and forget, as if all else fails, it will charge between 1130-0530 at the 7p anyway

No it won't. As 23:30-05:30 is completely irrelevant in respect of charging. And Octopus have had the price cap setting removed from the Ohme app so that people actually start using the tariff as it is designed to be used rather than a dumb TOU tariff like Go.

 

[andyvee]

It just isn't realistic to expect it to be adjusted every time the car is put on charge

Apart from the fact that everyone agreed to doing exactly that as part of the Ts&Cs when joining the tariff. And not reading what you have signed up to is not an excuse either.

Octopus are making changes to how IOG works due to the amount of gaming/abuse, which leaving set to way more charge than you need falls into if intentional or not. They have already removed the price cap option and the ability to disable dynamic charging in the Ohme app to force people to use it as a dynamic tariff as designed. I suspect the next moves will be to restrict the Ready by times to 04:00-11:00 the same as the Octopus app is for all other 'flavours' of IOG, and to identify those who are not specifying to a reasonable degree of accuracy how much charge they need.

If you can't be bothered adjusting how much charge you need, maybe Octopus billing any charging outside of 23:30-05:30 at peak rates due to the tariff not being used correctly may incentivise.

 

[Jomarkh]

I thought it was strange that the Zappi and Wallbox have the 4-11am ready by slot but the ohme doesn't

 

[tsedge]

Apart from the fact that everyone agreed to doing exactly that as part of the Ts&Cs when joining the tariff. And not reading what you have signed up to is not an excuse either.

Octopus are making changes to how IOG works due to the amount of gaming/abuse, which leaving set to way more charge than you need falls into if intentional or not. They have already removed the price cap option and the ability to disable dynamic charging in the Ohme app to force people to use it as a dynamic tariff as designed. I suspect the next moves will be to restrict the Ready by times to 04:00-11:00 the same as the Octopus app is for all other 'flavours' of IOG, and to identify those who are not specifying to a reasonable degree of accuracy how much charge they need.

If you can't be bothered adjusting how much charge you need, maybe Octopus billing any charging outside of 23:30-05:30 at peak rates due to the tariff not being used correctly may incentivise.

You are not Octopus Andy, although you seem to be well plugged into their inside operation. I may well assume everything you say is truthful, but that is me taking you at your word.

If they have a problem with anything I or anyone are doing, they need to talk to me.

Frankly, it is absurd that they have done nothing for so long when there's obvious things they could do, such as:

• Force people to reselect on the app every night how much charge they need.
• Monitor people and warn them if they are consistently getting this wrong.
• Measure and predict the percentage of people who do this and allow for it.
• Advertise very clearly to people about this and make it much clearer how to use it.

I have also pointed out before that if you are not the only driver it isn't as simple as making a note of the SoC when you leave the car because you aren't in the car in the first place.

I never read the small print, hardly anybody ever does. I didn't even know it wasn't supposed to work like this: set and forget is the obvious way.

I am not responsible for Octopus' non-obvious design of the solution. You are also not responsible for policing compliance with their terms and conditions - unless you do actually work for them?

However well informed you may be, you don't represent them, so no matter how passionate you are about this, it doesn't carry weight with me.

I am not going to change my usage just because someone on a forum insists I must.

Despite all that, I wish you well and there's a consistency and detail about what you say that tells me it is probably all accurate.

Let me be clear. Octopus? Octopus? Are you out there? Talk to your customers if you have an issue with their behaviour and try to understand you may have caused it through your own bad decisions.

 

[tonybridge]

You are not Octopus Andy, although you seem to be well plugged into their inside operation. I may well assume everything you say is truthful, but that is me taking you at your word.

If they have a problem with anything I or anyone are doing, they need to talk to me.

Frankly, it is absurd that they have done nothing for so long when there's obvious things they could do, such as:

• Force people to reselect on the app every night how much charge they need.
• Monitor people and warn them if they are consistently getting this wrong.
• Measure and predict the percentage of people who do this and allow for it.
• Advertise very clearly to people about this and make it much clearer how to use it.

I have also pointed out before that if you are not the only driver it isn't as simple as making a note of the SoC when you leave the car because you aren't in the car in the first place.

I never read the small print, hardly anybody ever does. I didn't even know it wasn't supposed to work like this: set and forget is the obvious way.

I am not responsible for Octopus' non-obvious design of the solution. You are also not responsible for policing compliance with their terms and conditions - unless you do actually work for them?

However well informed you may be, you don't represent them, so no matter how passionate you are about this, it doesn't carry weight with me.

I am not going to change my usage just because someone on a forum insists I must.

Despite all that, I wish you well and there's a consistency and detail about what you say that tells me it is probably all accurate.

Let me be clear. Octopus? Octopus? Are you out there? Talk to your customers if you have an issue with their behaviour and try to understand you may have caused it through your own bad decisions.

Tsedge
Using the Octopus app seems pretty obvious to me, helped in no small measure by andyvee and his fellow admins and the Files and Features on their FB page. I don’t think anyone is trying to force you into anything, just asking you to use common sense, and not try to take advantage of the cheap tariff.

 

[tsedge]

Tsedge
Using the Octopus app seems pretty obvious to me, helped in no small measure by andyvee and his fellow admins and the Files and Features on their FB page. I don’t think anyone is trying to force you into anything, just asking you to use common sense, and not try to take advantage of the cheap tariff.

Tony, it wasn't obvious and that is why I originally asked for clarification here on these forums on whether I had to set it every charge. I would never have signed up if that had been clear.

I am not taking advantage of anything, I don't care about the cheap rate outside the core hours, it was the expanded core hours that appealed to me over the original Go product. I just wanted 6 hours to charge my car at a lower rate - with the same "plug in and forget" experience I already had with my Zappi on the original Go.

If Octopus ever do have a problem with my usage, I will simply move to another provider. But they've said nothing in many months.

 

[tonybridge]

Tony, it wasn't obvious and that is why I originally asked for clarification here on these forums on whether I had to set it every charge. I would never have signed up if that had been clear.

I am not taking advantage of anything, I don't care about the cheap rate outside the core hours, it was the expanded core hours that appealed to me over the original Go product. I just wanted 6 hours to charge my car at a lower rate - with the same "plug in and forget" experience I already had with my Zappi on the original Go.

If Octopus ever do have a problem with my usage, I will simply move to another provider. But they've said nothing in many months.

You don't have to set the schedule every time, if you're OK with adding the same amount each time (though it's the work of a few seconds to change the schedule).

Apologies, I didn't mean that you, personally, would take advantage of anything - I guess 'one' would have to be a very serious over-user of the cheap tariff for Octopus to take notice...

 

[tsedge]

You don't have to set the schedule every time, if you're OK with adding the same amount each time (though it's the work of a few seconds to change the schedule).

Apologies, I didn't mean that you, personally, would take advantage of anything - I guess 'one' would have to be a very serious over-user of the cheap tariff for Octopus to take notice...

That's ok, I was just trying to be clear. I agree.