Southern electric - £40 a week on prepayment :(

prettykins

im with southern electric and gas, who forced me to have prepayment meters for both. The electric is costing me £1o a week. Gas is costing me £40 a week ( there is a £6 debt coming off it every week). Im a single parent, my child is 2 and we live on £100 a week, so the gas and electric are taking half of my weekly money. I cannot afford to keep it up and im having to borrow money just to be able to have hot water.
The only reason the debt built up is because they didnt bill me correctly - i never recieved a bill off them for about 2 years.
I have spoken to them today to see if i can get on the low income tarrif, and they said no as im not spending over 14% of my income on energy ( they include summer aswell), at the moment im spending 50% of my weekly income on it. The only thing they will do for me is give me a £50 rebate for each utility, and i wont recieve it until april. Thats not really any help at all.
Even with the debt of £6 coming off weekly, that means im spending £34 a week on gas. i only ever have 2 radiators switched on for 3 hours a day,the gas fire has been condemmed, and the only other thing is the gas oven hob.
I have also rang and asked home heat who are sending me a booklet, but cant actually do anything.
I cant afford this, and i dont think its right either.
Does anyone know what i can do?

HappyMJ

It is rather cold. You need to cut down. Turn everything off and leave the house. Go visit people. Less than £5 per day on heating, cooking and hot water for the coldest week of the year so far isn't really that much. £10 per week on electric is just enough for most people basic uses for refrigeration, lighting, cooking and so on.

HappyMJ

You should be getting more than £100 per week in benefits and child support. Check you are getting the maximum benefits and the maximum amount of child support. Income support £65.45, Child tax Credit £54.67, Child Benefit £20.30 and Child Support minimum £5 most probably if NRP earns minimum wage and has no other children it's £28 per week. So I make it a total of £168.42 plus your housing benefit and council tax benefit which in my case would be £107.07 for rent and £16.51 in ctb. Added to the £168.42 makes it £292 per week. To be in fuel poverty they take that figure and multiply that by 15% which then makes £43.80 per week. You are spending £44 per week on fuel so you are right on the edge of not being in fuel poverty.

spiro

Given your low income you may be able to get the debt recovery rate reduced slightly. Write down in detail all your income and outgoings and then phone them up. Unfortunately it will probably only reduce it from £6 to £3.50 which is the minimum I think they accept.

KimYeovil

prettykins wrote: »

I cant afford this, and i dont think its right either.
Does anyone know what i can do?

As a single parent you should receive about £600 per month in benefits. You claim you only receive £435. Where is the other £165?

If you have a prepayment meter then you have a couple of choices: save up over summer when your heating bills are low or spend more of your winter income on fuel. If you have not bothered to save over the summer (stick money in the meter if you are not disciplined enough to keep the cash safe) then you will have to pay a big chunk of your income when it is cold.

I am not sure what you think is 'not right'. You did not bother to pay bills for a couple of years and are being asked to repay only £6 per week. Where's the big injustice? As mentioned elsewhere, if you whinge you can get this lowered to about £3.30 per week.

£34 per week or less than £5 per day is not a lot for heating in cold weather. You are paying a small premium but that is your choice (not your supplier's 'forced decision') for deciding not to manage your credit meter sensibly.

Even if your effective income is only £100 and not £140 I fail to see why you can not 'afford' to pay £34 on those odd weeks a few times a year when it is cold. Why are you borrowing more money instead of adjusting your expenditure to your income?

spiro

Given that a lot of european countries charge more for there fuel and dont offer prepayment meters (pay up or get cut off applies) then think yourself lucky (you may not think so) that you have been given an interest free loan by you gas and elec supplier which you are now having to repay.

As other have suggested, go to the library and read a book or read to your child. Heating there is free.