Electricity/gas split for Government discount scheme

BrockC

Hello.  I'm a prepayment customer with two different suppliers: Boost (OVO) for electricity and British Gas for gas.  My usage is currently around £45/month for electricity and £30/month for gas.

I received my first Government discount voucher from Boost a few days ago, for £66.  As I understand it, there is no way of transferring the electricity discount to my gas meter.

This means that the Government discount scheme will put me about £20 in credit on my electricity each month, and I will still have to pay for gas myself.  At the end of the six-month voucher scheme, I estimate that my electricity meter will be about £120 in credit.  I won't be able to use any of this for my gas heating during the winter, although it looks as though I'll be getting free electricity until about July.

Is this really how it's meant to work?

QrizB

Welcome to the forum.

BrockC said:

Is this really how it's meant to work?

Yes, that's how it's meant to work.

BrockC

Well thanks, although it does seem a bit crazy.  I thought the scheme was supposed to help people with their heating costs over the winter, not give them free electricity in the spring!

MorningcoffeeIV

You'd use the money you're not spending on electricity towards your gas.  

It would be crazy for some of the discount to go towards gas as not everyone has gas.  This way, just about everyone gets the benefit.

ariarnia

yes. you would normally be paying £75 each month onto your electric and gas meter. you are not paying 45 on to your electric meter because you have a voutcher. put that money (or some of it) onto your gas meter. or is there something we're missing that means that doesn't work? 

BrockC

MorningcoffeeIV said:

You'd use the money you're not spending on electricity towards your gas. 

But I only spend £45/month on electricity.  The discount is more than the cost of my monthly electricity usage.

The discount scheme isn't going to give me any extra money to spend on gas.  I'm still going to have to find it out of my own money.  I won't get the benefit of the scheme until next spring, when the vouchers run out and the credit balance on my electricity meter runs down.

QrizB

BrockC said:

MorningcoffeeIV said:

You'd use the money you're not spending on electricity towards your gas. 

But I only spend £45/month on electricity.  The discount is more than the cost of my monthly electricity usage.

The discount scheme isn't going to give me any extra money to spend on gas.

You'll have the £45 you would otherwise have spent on electricity. You can spend that on gas instead.

BrockC

Yeah OK, thanks.  I just didn't think it was going to work like that!

EssexHebridean

Think of it like this. You go to the shop (I appreciate you probably actually do this online, but bear with me!) with your card for the electric - plus your government help voucher - and your card for the gas. You would normally handover £45 for the electricity, but instead st the moment you just use the government help voucher instead  - so you still have that £45 in your pocket. That means that when you top up the gas, you can now put your usual £30, plus the £45 you’ve saved on your electricity onto the gas. Does that make sense? 

[Deleted User]

You might even find that when you go to the shop with your vouchers, they actually exchange the voucher for £66 in cash out of the till and you can put it on whichever top-up you like.

BrockC

No cash changes hands.  They scan the barcode and Paypoint automatically credits the £66 to my key.

Unfortunately British Gas withdrew from the Paypoint system a few years ago and use a rival system called "Payzone", or Post Office outlets.  Were that not the case, I could probably have used the October and November vouchers for electricity and the December voucher for gas (since two vouchers cover the cost of three months' electricity).  Instead, the December credit will simply sit on my electricity meter unused, and so will the March credit.

As I said, I won't lose out because I'll get free electricity in April, May and June - but it seems a long time to wait!