Will £400 be paid into gas or electric account?

Mstty

superkoopauk said:

In reality no one knows how this £400 will be paid yet.  As before BEIS will have to design the scheme and we all saw how they struggled with the original £200 loan proposal.  But logically although electricity supplies are used to identify the households due a credit the money is meant to go against both fuels.

It is pretty clear

Energy Bills Support Scheme doubled to a one-off £400:

Households will get £400 of support with their energy bills through an expansion of the Energy Bills Support Scheme.

As well as doubling the £200 of support announced earlier this year, the full £400 payment will now be made as a grant, which will not be recovered through higher bills in future years.

Energy suppliers will deliver this support to households with a domestic electricity meter over six months from October. Direct debit and credit customers will have the money credited to their account, while customers with pre-payment meters will have the money applied to their meter or paid via a voucher.

This support will apply directly for households in England, Scotland, and Wales. It is GB-wide and we will deliver equivalent support to people in Northern Ireland.

This support is in addition to the £150 Council Tax rebate for households in England in Council Tax bands A-D, which was announced in February, and which millions of households have already received.

Source 

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/cost-of-living-support/cost-of-living-support-factsheet-26-may-2022

Mstty

MattMattMattUK said:

clairewoods said:

2 address, seperate households but one meter/one energy account in Landlords name.  We both pay our share of the bill.  Are we both eligible for the £400 and who to contact to make them aware of this? 

The amount will be paid into the account for the meter which by the sound of it is in the landlords name. Only one £400 payment will be made. 

@clairewoods don't forget the landlord can not make a profit on energy supplied so whatever share you pay if it's a percentage you should pre empt this by having a word with your landlord now.

Always best to start discussions early.

brewerdave

Mstty said:

MattMattMattUK said:

clairewoods said:

2 address, seperate households but one meter/one energy account in Landlords name.  We both pay our share of the bill.  Are we both eligible for the £400 and who to contact to make them aware of this? 

The amount will be paid into the account for the meter which by the sound of it is in the landlords name. Only one £400 payment will be made. 

@clairewoods don't forget the landlord can not make a profit on energy supplied so whatever share you pay if it's a percentage you should pre empt this by having a word with your landlord now.

Always best to start discussions early.

The landlord can't charge more for the tariff but can't see why/how he can be forced to handover any or part of the £400 IF his name is on the bill.

Mstty

brewerdave said:

Mstty said:

MattMattMattUK said:

clairewoods said:

2 address, seperate households but one meter/one energy account in Landlords name.  We both pay our share of the bill.  Are we both eligible for the £400 and who to contact to make them aware of this? 

The amount will be paid into the account for the meter which by the sound of it is in the landlords name. Only one £400 payment will be made. 

@clairewoods don't forget the landlord can not make a profit on energy supplied so whatever share you pay if it's a percentage you should pre empt this by having a word with your landlord now.

Always best to start discussions early.

The landlord can't charge more for the tariff but can't see why/how he can be forced to handover any or part of the £400 IF his name is on the bill.

Bit of a grey area hence the need for discussion between tenant and landlord which I have suggested. 

In this particular case it appears the landlord and tenant have an agreement of splitting the energy bill so this does remove some of the legal grey area. 

What isn't clear is if the landlord is allowed to take the payment out and suggest they can spend it on other cost of living expenses.

Gerry1

Mstty said:

superkoopauk said:

In reality no one knows how this £400 will be paid yet.  As before BEIS will have to design the scheme and we all saw how they struggled with the original £200 loan proposal.  But logically although electricity supplies are used to identify the households due a credit the money is meant to go against both fuels.

It is pretty clear

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/cost-of-living-support/cost-of-living-support-factsheet-26-may-2022

Oh no, it isn't !

Unfortunately two points are somewhat ambiguous.  Having to be published in haste, it hasn't yet been thought through sufficiently.

1. "Energy suppliers will deliver this support to households with a domestic electricity meter over six months from October."  Does this mean that there will be six payments of £66.66?
Or does it mean that energy suppliers are allowed six months to complete working their way through their databases and making a single payment of £400 to each customer?

Either way, this may get complicated for customers who change their energy supplier during the six month period.

2. "Direct debit and credit customers will have the money credited to their account...".  It mentions Direct Debit, so it could be interpreted as being paid into their Bank account.  However, it's probably intended to refer to their Energy account because Credit customers pay on receipt of bill, so the energy supplier won't necessarily know their banking details; indeed, if they pay in cash they may not even have a bank account.  But this is a subtle point which can easily be overlooked, so it needs to be re-written to make it clearer. 

Again, this may cause problems for customers who change their energy supplier.

GingerTim

Gerry1 said:

Mstty said:

superkoopauk said:

In reality no one knows how this £400 will be paid yet.  As before BEIS will have to design the scheme and we all saw how they struggled with the original £200 loan proposal.  But logically although electricity supplies are used to identify the households due a credit the money is meant to go against both fuels.

It is pretty clear

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/cost-of-living-support/cost-of-living-support-factsheet-26-may-2022

Oh no, it isn't !

Unfortunately two points are somewhat ambiguous.  Having to be published in haste, it hasn't yet been thought through sufficiently.

1. "Energy suppliers will deliver this support to households with a domestic electricity meter over six months from October."  Does this mean that there will be six payments of £66.66?
Or does it mean that energy suppliers are allowed six months to complete working their way through their databases and making a single payment of £400 to each customer?

Either way, this may get complicated for customers who change their energy supplier during the six month period.

2. "Direct debit and credit customers will have the money credited to their account...".  It mentions Direct Debit, so it could be interpreted as being paid into their Bank account.  However, it's probably intended to refer to their Energy account because Credit customers pay on receipt of bill, so the energy supplier won't necessarily know their banking details; indeed, if they pay in cash they may not even have a bank account.  But this is a subtle point which can easily be overlooked, so it needs to be re-written to make it clearer. 

Again, this may cause problems for customers who change their energy supplier.

1. This reads to me to almost certainly mean 6 x £66.66 credits to bills from October - giving energy companies six months to distribute the money in one go would be a recipe for disaster, and the support is going to be really needed from October onwards.

Besides, if everyone suddenly had a £400 credit on their bill, what would be to stop customers withdrawing it as cash? (assuming they aren't massively in debt by that point)

2. Again, as you suggest, almost certainly to their energy account - but agree, that should be clarified.

Mstty

Pretty clear to me, I think we can all pull apart any statement if we want to

If it's not clear to you then fair enough we are different people👍

JohnM5206

No difficulty of interpretation for me: I am billed every six months for electricity usage and was billed 23rd March so the next bill will be 23rd September. I do not expect to see the credit on my bill until that issued 23rd March 2023, just falling within the 6 months laid down to complete the payments

Ultrasonic

t0rt0ise said:

If the £400 is paid monthly it's going to make changing suppliers complicated.

The same would be true of a single payment of £400 if made at different times to different customers over a 6 month period.

Spoonie_Turtle

Ultrasonic said:

t0rt0ise said:

If the £400 is paid monthly it's going to make changing suppliers complicated.

The same would be true of a single payment of £400 if made at different times to different customers over a 6 month period.

Not really.  When the customer moves across, it would be a simple piece of information to include: 'this person has / has not received the £400 credit'.