Octopus Energy Review: Get £50 Cashback Referral & Really Cheap Energy

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Octopus Energy Switch Review & £50 Referral Cashback Credit

When it comes to recommending an energy company based on excellent value pricing and customer service, it couldn’t be any easier than it is to recommend Octopus Energy. To top that all off it’s a 100% green energy supplier.

Not only can you expect consistently cheap energy prices you can also be confident that if for any reason you do have to contact them they are extremely easy and quick to get hold of to sort any issues you may have. It’s clear they take immense pride in their customer service, which is very reassuring if you are remotely concerned about incurring any problems switching.

Notice: With the recent surge in energy prices and most energy companies offering flexible tariffs at energy price cap price there really is very little reason to switch right now. In fact, most energy companies are not allowing switching at the price cap rate.

We have therefore removed referral links for the time being.

As a new customer, you can also claim the octopus energy £50 referral credit.

Reason to Consider Choosing Octopus Energy

Consistently cheap energy rates (save up to £200 – £300+ a year)
Initial £50 cashback credit when you switch using the referral link
Highly rated customer service
Fast email replies of any supplier (according to Which?)
No early exit fee
Refer friends and family and get £50 each time
All tariffs use 100% green energy
No massive price hikes after the first year

See the Octopus Energy About Us page for more info.

Quick and Easy-Switch Process and £50 Credit

Switching your energy supply to Octopus Energy couldn’t be easier.

Simply visit the homepage via a referral link to qualify for your £50 credit.

Input your postcode, you should see a message on the page, saying something like “Special Offer £50 credit for you and referrals name if you sign up now”, in our case in shows my wife name as she is the registered bill payer.

You’ll then go through to the next screen where you simply have to answer the following 4 questions:

Location (your postcode should already be showing here)
Which energy supply do you need? (gas & electricity or electricity only)
What type of meter do you have (standard, economy 7 or smart)
How much energy do you use? (just as a ballpark guide)

Here’s what you can expect to see on the site:

The final question as you see below related to how much energy you think you use.

You can quickly and simply by choosing low, medium or high depending on whether the details for each match your likely energy requirements.

If you know your actual energy usage figures you can click “actual usage” and input your figures, or edit the figures you see under the closest option to your household type.

Finally, click “Quote me” to be presented with your quotes for each of the different tariff options.

Below you can see I was shown the following, bearing mind I have 3 children currently studying from home due to lockdowns so my bills are pretty high, and all the more reason to be getting them lower.

The 3 main tariffs to choose from are:

Flexible Octopus Tariff

At the time of writing, this was the cheapest tariff as highlighted in the image above.

As well as really cheap energy, their electricity is 100% renewable.

It’s a variable tariff, so there’s always the possibility the price can move up and down as the wholesale market prices move. However, if the price does rise, Octopus will give you at least 30 days notice.

You then have the choice to maybe switch to a more stable fixed price tariff, or maybe even switch suppliers altogether if the other energy companies haven’t also increased their prices.

So far in the last few years leading up to early 2021 octopus have consistently offered low prices and I’m hoping that doesn’t change.

Octopus 12M Fixed Tariff

If you prefer more stable energy prices from the start you could choose the 1 year fixed option.

In my example above it would mean I could expect to be paying £5.68 more per month, or 5.9% extra compared to the cheapest tariff.

Although it’s fixed there are no exit fees and you can change at any time.

Many people like the idea of fixed costs when it comes to energy bills and the Octopus 12 month fixed is one of the most popular tariffs.

Super Green Octopus Tariff

If you don’t mind paying just a little extra above the fixed-rate option, just £1.38 more a month in my quoted case, you could opt for the Super Green Octopus tariff.

100% of your electricity usage is matched by renewable sources.

Your gas usage is fully carbon offset through their partner Renewable World.

The Super Green tariff is fixed for 12 months, and there are again no exit fees so you can switch anytime.

Smart Meter Tariffs

If you have a smart meter you will be offered a different range of options.

Currently, they are:

agileOctopus
Octopusgo
outgoingOctopus

agileOctopus

Allows you to shift energy usage outside 4-7 pm peak to save money.

Octopusgo

Offers a super off-peak electricity rate, ideal for charging an electric vehicle

outgoingOctopus

Pays you for exporting electricity you generate from solar panels or battery storage.

Switching Is Easy

Simply fill in your name and address details.

Set up a direct debit and choose which date of every month you would like payments to be taken.

I kept mine the same as the forecast first payment date.

Advanced Billing

Your first payment effectively means you are being billed in advance of actual usage because your new account will not have been live for long.

Your first payment will be your predicted bill divided by 12 months. Over time, this will be adjusted based on your usage and also factoring in the seasons, as in winter you typically use more than your average bill and less in the summer months.

This is where the £50 credit comes in handy and will likely offset a good portion of this advanced payment.

Also in my case, as you can see in my personal switch experience below, the direct debit to my existing energy supplier was cancelled, so for the month it was just like paying our bill as normal, just to a cheaper supplier.

Support for the Vulnerable

As part of the sign-up process, there’s a check box to indicate whether support is needed for vulnerable customers.

This is what we like to see from an energy company, one that looks out for those in a less fortunate position. Together with their excellent customer support reputation, you can rest assured you will quickly and easily be in contact with a member of staff to sort any issues and concerns you may have.

Switch Guarantee

Octopus Energy is a member of the Energy Switch Guarantee. This gives you peace of mind that you can expect the switch to:

Be completed within 21 days
The new supplier takes care of the switch
No break-in energy supply
14-day cooling-off period if you change your mind about switching
No doubling billing on energy, you only pay once for the energy you use
Credit balance refunded within 14 days of the final bill by the old supplier

I personally switch without thinking as I have done so many times over the years with no problems.

However, if you have never switched before, I can imagine there all kinds of questions and potential issues that might run through your mind.

I can assure you switching really is as easy and simple as I make it sound.

It’s just a matter of signing up and all the switching is done behind the scenes. You will be updated on progress via your emails, and that really is all there is to it.

My Personal Switch Timeline

To give you an idea of how you can expect your switch to progress, here are the details and timeline of our own personal switch experience:

Day 1: Thanks for choosing Octopus email
Day 8: Current energy supplier cancels DD
Day 8: Octopus confirm switch approved
Day 10: Reminder of the new direct debit date
Day 12: Request for first-meter reading
Day 17: Confirmation switch complete – now an Octopus customer

Day 1

Received “Thanks for choosing” Octopus email which confirmed all the details of the switch at a glance, including:

Start date
Monthly direct debit amount
Date of the first payment
Octopus energy contact details
Confirmation of referral reward

The email confirmed clearly that Octopus Energy intends to be very easy for customers to get hold of, infact they answer emails 7 days a week between the hours of 9 am to 10 pm.

There was also confirmation of £50 referral reward to be added to my account 10 days after starting my supply and payment of the first direct debit. Feel free to start your account the same way using our referral from the links on this page.

I also received a separate email from Greg Jackson, the CEO and founder of Octopus Energy. In it, Greg confirmed commitment to low prices and no tease and squeeze massive price hikes after first year, as often used by the Big 6.

Day 8

Email 1: Confirmation from my existing energy supplier that my Direct Debit subscription had been cancelled and I would be incurring no further charges from them.

Email 2: Confirmation from Octopus to confirm switch has been approved and they will be supplying my energy from day 17.

Day 10

A reminder email from Octopus confirming the date when the first Direct Debit payment will be taken. Also includes links to information to help anyone who is struggling to pay their bills at the moment.

Day 12

This was the first email that required us to take some action in order to prevent double billing.

We were requested to submit our first-meter reading. All we needed to do was collect the meter readings for our gas and electric and submit them to Octopus simply by clicking a link in the email.

There was no logging in or anything, just taken to a page that showed our details and an area to input the gas reading. Once that was done, I simply clicked the link to submit the electric meter readings. It literally takes a few seconds.

Day 17

Received confirmation that the energy switch was now complete and I’m on one of the lowest rates in the UK!

Every email includes a helpful “Your Account at a glance” which shows your current account balance without having to login as well as providing quick links to:

Balance explained
Checking your monthly payment amount
Balance history
Email Preferences
Submitting a meter reading

Every email from the very first includes your own personal referral link to recommend friends and family to share £100 between you both (£50 each).

Octopus Energy Reviews

As a potential new customer, you are obviously going to want to know if Octopus Energy is any good?

Well, going by Trustpilot review scores, they certainly have a very good reputation, scoring a very high 4.8 out of 5, the highest rating I have seen for an energy company with thousands of reviews.Not only does Octopus Energy have a great score, but drilling down into the reviews a little more we can see as of February 2021 the following:

It is very rare to see any kind of business with such excellent review scores let alone an energy company. Note, 45,000+ reviews is a very large sample size too.

91% of reviewers rate the company Excellent and 5% Great, for a total of 96% Great or above.

This brings me on to the next point, no wonder Octopus Energy is a regular Which? Award Winner.

Which? Recommend Energy Supplier

Octopus Energy, which was only founded in 2015, has at least in the eyes of Which?, has won the title of Which? Recommended Provider for Energy Suppliers, for no less than 4 years in a row! Including 2021.

You can read more about why here.

Which? state that Octopus Energy “gets strong ratings across the board, from its bills to its customer service. Its customers were among the least likely to have had problems with their supplier“.

Regarding the accuracy of bills, it Which? stated: “it had the highest proportion of customers who rated the accuracy of its bills as ‘excellent’“.

All in all, that’s exactly what customers want in an energy company and exactly what Octopus Energy has set out to do from day one, and that is providing excellent customer service and great value energy.

Fun Bonus Option – Spin to Win

As a nice extra surprise, when submitting my meter reading I was presented with the option of spinning to win a prize.

The Spin to win rules were as follows:

2 spins per calendar month (one for each reading of gas and electric)
Need to spin with 30 days of giving reading (I just did it straight away)

Prizes on the wheel were

£0
£1
£64
£512

This might seem strange amounts, but being Octopus Energy, they like there 8’s (8 x 8 =£64 & £64 x 8 = £512), hence the prize amounts.

Fastest Email Responses

One of the reasons Octopus was chosen was because they had the fastest email replies of any supplier. So as a customer, if you do have any issues at all you can be assured you will receive fast active responses from the business in order to solve them.

As of the 19th of the month when I did my first spins, they had already had 6005 winners.

Frequently Asked Questions

When Is the £50 cashback awarded?

Your £50 friend referral cashback should be credited to your account approximately 10 days after Octopus Energy have started supplying your energy, and after the first direct debit payment has been taken.

How Soon Can You Start Referring Friends and Family?

You can start referring friends and family as soon as you are signed up as a new customer, even before the switch has been completed.

You’ll be presented with your own unique referral link, no further code is required.

Usually, I wait to see how my switch goes, but with Octopus it’s clear they are an excellent company and based on my own experience I would start recommending them to friends and family straight away. Not only are your family and friends likely to save £100’s a year on their energy bills, they also get the free £50 credit to start off their account.

Is Octopus Energy Cheap?

Yes, Octopus energy is consistently one of the cheapest energy providers in the UK.

At the time of writing, February 2021, I used the MSE Cheap Energy Club comparisons tool excluding cashback, because none is offered by that service, it was in the Top 5 cheapest.

Combing with a £50 cashback referral would have made it the cheapest option.

Of those top 5 cheapest suppliers Octopus Energy had the highest customer service rating.

Octopus Energy is committed to keeping prices low and promise no massive price hikes after the first year.

A common tactic used by many energy companies is to offer cheap new customer deals and increase prices down the line.

My previous energy supplier, Igloo Energy raised prices 10% just weeks after I signed up because they were one of the cheapest.

Is Octopus Energy a Green Supplier?

Yes, all Octopus Energy tariffs are 100% renewable energy. No old fashioned burning fossil fuels releasing carbon and causing harm to our world environment and climate.

You can read more about Octopus Renewable energy here.