Octopus Intelligient & Location

[colin123]

Hi all, Octopus Intelligent has been running great for many months, recently it just has a mind of its own no matter what Octopus or the BMW has set (my charger is just set to dumb mode usually so has no say). So, it will just start charging randomly and not stop until 100% charge. My first email to Octopus they say they have been receiving errors about my car’s location? My app always shows my i3's correct location when parked - any ideas anyone ?

 

[mojo]

Mine has starting doing the same in the last few days - according to a post on one of the UK-based i3 groups, BMW made a change to something on 30th October and it stopped IOG from working correctly. Unfortunately I don't know the source of their info, nor whether it has been fixed!

 

[colin123]

Mine has starting doing the same in the last few days - according to a post on one of the UK-based i3 groups, BMW made a change to something on 30th October and it stopped IOG from working correctly. Unfortunately I don't know the source of their info, nor whether it has been fixed!

ouch! Could be plausable? Any way you can dig a bit deeper on the other forum/s ?

 

[mojo]

The only info I have is as follows (plus the fact that the incident has now been reported as fixed):

Incident updated
BMW/MINI: Degraded performance when linking vehicles
Monitoring
Started October 30, 2024 12:06 PM UTC
Fixes have been implemented for all flows and we are monitoring the solution.

Affected Components
Vehicle APIsBMW
Degraded performance
Vehicle APIsMINI
Degraded performance

 

[jeeringtowser]

Hi all, Octopus Intelligent has been running great for many months, recently it just has a mind of its own no matter what Octopus or the BMW has set (my charger is just set to dumb mode usually so has no say). So, it will just start charging randomly and not stop until 100% charge. My first email to Octopus they say they have been receiving errors about my car’s location? My app always shows my i3's correct location when parked - any ideas anyone ?

My I3s has also developed a mind of it's own whilst charging using a 13amp plug.
I plug it in, it charges for about 5 minutes then sets a schedule, the first time starts ok then it randomly starts charging randomly, also it will charge past the preset battery % at the end of charging.
Octopus sent me a list of items to check
ere are a few steps you can follow to ensure your car charges correctly with the Intelligent Octopus Go tariff:

1. Check for Other Schedules: Ensure there are no other charging schedules set up in your car or charger. These can interfere with the Intelligent Octopus Go schedule. You can disable them to give full control to the Intelligent Octopus Go schedule. We have got third party intervention that is charging the car outside of our charging schedule.
2. Manual Intervention: If your car starts charging immediately after plugging in, you may need to manually stop the charge via the vehicle itself. Once the charge has stopped, switch it back on manually through the vehicle without unplugging it. This should align the charging with the Intelligent Octopus Go schedule.
3. Ensure Car is at Home: Intelligent Octopus Go identifies your car's location as 'home' based on where it was during the onboarding process. If your car was not at home during onboarding, you might need to log out of your car in the Intelligent Octopus Go app and go through the process again while your car is at home.
4. Check Connection: Sometimes, the car might not let us control the charge if it loses connection. Ensure your car is properly plugged in and that the car and charger used are the ones set up on your Intelligent Octopus account.
5. Update Software: If there has been a recent software or firmware update on your EV or Tesla app, ensure that previous saved preferences for schedules and limiters are reset within your EV/app to ensure your smart charging experience.

If you continue to experience issues, please let us know, and we can investigate further.
Most were common sense, let's hope if the issue is with BMW they can quickly resolve this!

 

[jeeringtowser]

ouch! Could be plausable? Any way you can dig a bit deeper on the other forum/s ?

Which forums?

 

[oldstumpybiker]

I'm with Octopus although my home charger is Hive, I had issues like this when I connected the charger to the Octopus app, I found that disconnecting it from the app & just using the Hive schedule worked fine, you still get the cheap overnight rate.

 

[Barry Wyatt]

My I3s has also developed a mind of it's own whilst charging using a 13amp plug.
I plug it in, it charges for about 5 minutes then sets a schedule, the first time starts ok then it randomly starts charging randomly, also it will charge past the preset battery % at the end of charging.
Octopus sent me a list of items to check
ere are a few steps you can follow to ensure your car charges correctly with the Intelligent Octopus Go tariff:

1. Check for Other Schedules: Ensure there are no other charging schedules set up in your car or charger. These can interfere with the Intelligent Octopus Go schedule. You can disable them to give full control to the Intelligent Octopus Go schedule. We have got third party intervention that is charging the car outside of our charging schedule.
2. Manual Intervention: If your car starts charging immediately after plugging in, you may need to manually stop the charge via the vehicle itself. Once the charge has stopped, switch it back on manually through the vehicle without unplugging it. This should align the charging with the Intelligent Octopus Go schedule.
3. Ensure Car is at Home: Intelligent Octopus Go identifies your car's location as 'home' based on where it was during the onboarding process. If your car was not at home during onboarding, you might need to log out of your car in the Intelligent Octopus Go app and go through the process again while your car is at home.
4. Check Connection: Sometimes, the car might not let us control the charge if it loses connection. Ensure your car is properly plugged in and that the car and charger used are the ones set up on your Intelligent Octopus account.
5. Update Software: If there has been a recent software or firmware update on your EV or Tesla app, ensure that previous saved preferences for schedules and limiters are reset within your EV/app to ensure your smart charging experience.

If you continue to experience issues, please let us know, and we can investigate further.
Most were common sense, let's hope if the issue is with BMW they can quickly resolve this!

My 2020 i3s and my brother's 2022 i3s have both stared randomly going in to immediate charge after the octopus charging schedule has completed, then charging to 100%. Tried all the above plus changing BMW charge settings, all to no avail. Just deleted the BMW app to see if that will help...but doesn't need charging for a few days now!

 

[jeeringtowser]

My 2020 i3s and my brother's 2022 i3s have both stared randomly going in to immediate charge after the octopus charging schedule has completed, then charging to 100%. Tried all the above plus changing BMW charge settings, all to no avail. Just deleted the BMW app to see if that will help...but doesn't need charging for a few days now!

Can you please post your results when you re-install the BMW app?
Mine started charging out of the scheduled settings again today the schedule said 0:00 and it started charging at 13:30.

 

[Clanduncan]

I've had similar issues since September. For me though it has stemmed from lengthening my charge cable from 10 to 12.5m. A charge schedule would be set, but then ignored at some random time, and if I didn't notice then I charged at top rate! I enquired with Octopus, and they have said that there is '3rd party' interference that ignores the schedule and resets it. My EV charge point installer has now told me that my charge point (PodPoint) is susceptible to interference when long cables are used, which apparently affects the signal on the cable. Now PodPoint themselves have admitted a fault exists, and I worked through a check list (no change), so am now awaiting a resolution from PodPoint. Until this is sorted I am using the PodPoints own charge schedule service.

 

[Barry Wyatt]

Can you please post your results when you re-install the BMW app?
Mine started charging out of the scheduled settings again today the schedule said 0:00 and it started charging at 13:30.

Can you please post your results when you re-install the BMW app?
Mine started charging out of the scheduled settings again today the schedule said 0:00 and it started charging at 13:30.

No change with BMW app deleted or reinstalled. Advice from Octopus today is below. I have followed the advice and all seems good so far. Bit like turn it off and on again!

It sounds like you need to reintegrate your device with our Intelligent Octopus Go smart charging system.
To do this first you need to disconnect your device. You can do this by going by going into the Octopus Energy app and go on the 'Account and Settings' this can be found in the top right corner of the Octopus Energy app. Then click on the 'Devices' tile. Under the 'Device Settings' heading select 'Intelligent Octopus Go' and towards the bottom of the page select 'Disconnect Device'.
This will disconnect your device from our system. You can then turn exit the Octopus Energy app.
To reintegrate, reopen the Octopus Energy app and click on the devices tab on the panel at the bottom of the app page. Then select 'Add Device' and follow the on screen instructions to reintegrate the device.
Once done you should be all good to go again

 

[Gonville]

Just joining this chat. I like the checklist above from Octopus. I have used it successfully for at least a few years and the major problem seems to be with messages not reaching the car.

I think the car always starts charging when you plug it in and only pauses when the Octopus schedule is set by the issuing of the random future time interval ( as our dear old i3 has no ‘stop’ charging command). So that bit of their advice seems to admit to a problem. I thought it always charged and then stopped after a short time when the schedule was set. No schedule no stopping - which seems to be most people’s issue.

In the last few months there has been a myriad of folks with issues which all seem to be blamed on BMW. As far as I can see if the car doesn’t receive an SMS message ‘or’ (big ‘or”) the car isn’t at home because the permission to see location (GDPR) is periodically turned off (GPS needs cycling in car) and requires re-confirmation. This means (as above point 3) it doesn’t know where the car is - so won’t issue a schedule.

Also if the BMWid password has changed the octopus server can no longer access the BMW server using the stored credentials. (Good way to stop it though).

Another also - if the BMW myBMW app hasn’t been updated (mine is tagged for auto update but didn’t) the server doesn’t appear to recognise requests from the back version app.

Just a few thoughts from experience.

 

[Gonville]

No change with BMW app deleted or reinstalled. Advice from Octopus today is below. I have followed the advice and all seems good so far. Bit like turn it off and on again!

Did you change your BMWid password? At some point prior?

 

[robthebold]

Just joining this chat. I like the checklist above from Octopus. I have used it successfully for at least a few years and the major problem seems to be with messages not reaching the car.

I think the car always starts charging when you plug it in and only pauses when the Octopus schedule is set by the issuing of the random future time interval ( as our dear old i3 has no ‘stop’ charging command). So that bit of their advice seems to admit to a problem. I thought it always charged and then stopped after a short time when the schedule was set. No schedule no stopping - which seems to be most people’s issue.

In the last few months there has been a myriad of folks with issues which all seem to be blamed on BMW. As far as I can see if the car doesn’t receive an SMS message ‘or’ (big ‘or”) the car isn’t at home because the permission to see location (GDPR) is periodically turned off (GPS needs cycling in car) and requires re-confirmation. This means (as above point 3) it doesn’t know where the car is - so won’t issue a schedule.

Also if the BMWid password has changed the octopus server can no longer access the BMW server using the stored credentials. (Good way to stop it though).

Another also - if the BMW myBMW app hasn’t been updated (mine is tagged for auto update but didn’t) the server doesn’t appear to recognise requests from the back version app.

Just a few thoughts from experience.

BMW has recently added hCaptcha (sometimes) to the login for the connected services. If Octopus needs to login to their servers, they'll need to adapt to that. I found out from the HomeAssistant component's bug tracker when my HA BMW integration stopped working within the last few weeks. Bug reports came in from North America first, then "Rest of World" starting a few days later (haven't seen any reports from China). Hopefully Intelligent Octopus has an in with BMW -- for the HomeAssistant integration the devs just have to mess around with communication logs until they get it right.

 

[Barry Wyatt]

Did you change your BMWid password? At some point prior?

No. Been the same thoughout. Still randomly charging after trying everything

 

[colin123]

ok, so I reinstalled bmw app (password has NOT changed) plus reinstalled my charger and I3 to Octopus Intelligient (OI) and his has made no differance. I have not touched my I3, is there anyhting I need to do with GPS as Octopus says they just see error messages regarding my car location (although BMW app does show correct location) ? And does Octopus know about the ' hCaptcha ' and does that apply to the Uk and from when ? And yes, by the way, it is perfectly normal for charger to come on when plugged in as OI runs tests and sets a schedule, I get that evertime.

 

[jeeringtowser]

"sounds like you need to reintegrate your device with our Intelligent Octopus Go smart charging system.
To do this first you need to disconnect your device. You can do this by going by going into the Octopus Energy app and go on the 'Account and Settings' this can be found in the top right corner of the Octopus Energy app. Then click on the 'Devices' tile. Under the 'Device Settings' heading select 'Intelligent Octopus Go' and towards the bottom of the page select 'Disconnect Device'.
This will disconnect your device from our system. You can then turn exit the Octopus Energy app.
To reintegrate, reopen the Octopus Energy app and click on the devices tab on the panel at the bottom of the app page. Then select 'Add Device' and follow the on screen instructions to reintegrate the device.
Once done you should be all good to go again"

After a long protracted struggle I did what it says above and fingers crossed it has seemed to have fixed the issue!
Admittedly I have only charged once so far, but if you are experiencing the same issues ie. starting out of schedule and charging beyond the set limit it well worth a try!

 

[colin123]

Unforunatley that is the process I have already followed (and always do now whenever a problem) but to no avail I'm affraid!

 

[methanoid]

This is why I gave up with Intelligent (and also not wanting extra apps for no good reason) and use Go and have my charger set to charge at cheap times (not rocket science so why do Octopus make it complicated)

 

[mojo]

This is why I gave up with Intelligent (and also not wanting extra apps for no good reason) and use Go and have my charger set to charge at cheap times (not rocket science so why do Octopus make it complicated)

I don't think Octopus wanted to make it complicated.

They realised that their customers want to be able to control the amount that they charge their cars (rather than just always charging to 100%), but unfortunately BMW made it complicated by including no API command to stop charging. All of the complicated stuff to do with Departure Date/Times is what is necessary to get around that limitation.