British Gas explanation of how the EBSS scheme will work

Mstty

British gas will no doubt eff it up and refund £66/£67 +vat to the benefit of their customers 🤣🤣

Either way prescribed in the £400 info means in this example the customer pays £34 which I think is wrong they should pay their £100 and the £66/£67 goes on their account.

But what do I know

pochase

I am not sure how that will work if somebody pays less than the £67. In this case they only get back what they pay, and the £67 is credited to their account.

So it must show for them on their account as a credit different to their payment, and if you have to program this it would make sense to show the same for everybody.

isasmurf

Sea_Shell said:

So is the credit and subsequent refund NOT going to show as separate lines on your energy bill???

So if you pay £100 DD, the whole £100 is credited to your account, but the refund ISN'T part of your account balance, and is completely separate from it?

The Government has mandated it must be shown on your bill as coming from HM Government.  So it will be something like

DD payment £100
HM Government EBSS £66
Refund -£66

For those that have a small DD
DD payment £60
HM Government EBSS £66
Refund -£60

TheAble

Does the exact method really matter? As long as it all adds up to £400 that's good enough for me 

Sea_Shell

In my head, I saw it working something like this...depending on how each supplier handled the credit/DD.

Take 3 customers, each with the same balance, all paying £100 DD normally.   One gets a full credit after their DD is taken, one gets a reduced DD taken, and one just has the credit applied to their account, and doesn't receive the cash back.

	Customer 1	Customer 2	Customer 3
Opening account balance/usage	266	266	266
Government Credit	-66	-66	-66
Direct Debit paid	-100	-34	-100
Refund to Bank account	66	0	0
New balance carried forward	166	166	100
Cash in your pocket/bank	66	66	0

They are ALL £66 better off, however, customers 1 and 2 could spend it on anything....not necessarily energy?

Ultrasonic

Sea_Shell said:

They are ALL £66 better off, however, customers 1 and 2 could spend it on anything....not necessarily energy?

People paying more than £66 per month on energy bills will effectively pay £66 less to their energy companies each month and so can do whatever they wish with that money. Is that what you mean? That's true, but as above it's key that your energy account doesn't 'lose' this £66 - it has been used for energy.

Remember where we started this exchange was those paying less than £66 per month.

Ultrasonic

Just to add, if customers didn't end up paying less to energy companies than they otherwise would have then the government scheme wouldn't actually have helped anyone with the immediate issue. 

Sea_Shell

Ultrasonic said:

Sea_Shell said:

They are ALL £66 better off, however, customers 1 and 2 could spend it on anything....not necessarily energy?

People paying more than £66 per month on energy bills will effectively pay £66 less to their energy companies each month and so can do whatever they wish with that money. Is that what you mean? That's true, but as above it's key that your energy account doesn't 'lose' this £66 - it has been used for energy.

Remember where we started this exchange was those paying less than £66 per month.

It's going to be a very small % of households who only have an annual bill of £780, after October! ☹️


But yes, fundamentally is this cash a general cost of living payment or an energy rebate?


My worry is that come March people's energy account balances will not reflect the £400 that they have been given.


Like I said, time will tell how this plays out in the real world. 

Personally, I think it'll get increased to at least 6 x £100 😉

Section62

TheAble said:

Does the exact method really matter? As long as it all adds up to £400 that's good enough for me 

Some people will want some of the money to pay for gas, oil, coal or wood.

Others will want to maximise their Santander cashback.

So for them the exact method will matter.

Sea_Shell

Section62 said:

TheAble said:

Does the exact method really matter? As long as it all adds up to £400 that's good enough for me 

Some people will want some of the money to pay for gas, oil, coal or wood.

Others will want to maximise their Santander cashback.

So for them the exact method will matter.

True.

In my scenarios, customer 1 and 2 could use the money to buy alternative energy/fuel.

Customers 1 and 3 still benefit from full Santander cashback!


I'd prefer to be customer 3, if I had any choice 😉