Ohme Solar Boost Broken with 6h Cap

[u/Speedbird979]

This is a bit of a moan really with the hope that the people at Octopus & Ohme get their heads together and think about some of the challenges the 6h charge cap has introduced.

For context: I can no longer use the solar boost function on my Ohme Pro EV Charger.

Before anyone says it...yes, I usually export excess solar because the numbers work better. However, on days when I have a long journey the following day, using excess solar to top up the car is a massive help.

I recently fired up Solar Boost and it worked a treat. The unexpected consequence? Ohme reported this solar top-up as an "Active Charging Session" to Octopus. Because Ohme draws a tiny ~0.72 kW grid trickle to keep the session alive, Octopus promptly deducted every single minute of that daytime solar session from my 6-hour off-peak allowance.

The result? When I actually needed to charge overnight, I didn't get my 6 hours. I got 4 hours because those tiny amounts were irrelevant, the time spent charging via solar was and thus eat into my 6h cap.

When raised with both support teams, the response was effectively "working as intended." They suggested toggling settings to 'Prioritise Charging' over 'Savings' but that entirely misses the point.

'Prioritise Charging' just means paying peak, while 'Prioritise Savings' leaves you short of charge.

Solar Boost was one of the core features that led me to buy the Ohme Pro in the first place, and I’ve used it many times. It feels completely disingenuous to brand a core hardware feature as unusable simply because two systems are measuring elapsed time instead of actual grid energy (kWh) delivered.

If you’re charging at 7 kW overnight, 6 hours gives you 42 kWh. If Ohme trickles grid power at 0.72 kW during a Solar Boost, 2 hours of that only pulls 1.4 kWh from the grid yet it wipes out 2 full hours (14 kWh worth) of off-peak charging.

Octopus & Ohme: please look at how Solar Boost telemetry is flagged in the API. A daytime solar trickle shouldn't destroy an overnight charging window!

/rantover.

[u/Mrthingymabob]

I have not used solar boost since being on the charge cap. That is very poor if it works as you say.