Warm Home Discount: Minister promises to look at complaints after MSE investigation

MSE_Emily

Tens of thousands of financially vulnerable people are likely slipping through eligibility cracks in the £150 Warm Home Discount support scheme, according to MoneySavingExpert.com (MSE). After direct contact between MSE founder Martin Lewis and energy secretary Grant Shapps, the minister has promised he will look into the complaints...

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Warm Home Discount: Minister promises to look at complaints after MSE identifies 10,000s may be falling through eligibility cracks

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Spoonie_Turtle

Good.  The rollout has been a disgraceful mess (of course it has, did we expect anything else?!).

The "help"line has confused people making them think the property calculation is actually based on the EPC which it's not, that's just bizarrely the only source they accept for the size and age characteristics.

If a piece of information was missing the system was supposed to impute characteristics from similar buildings nearby.  That very clearly hasn't happened in some cases that we've had here.

There have also been reports from people who DON'T claim a qualifying benefit receiving it - people claiming new-style ESA, for instance.  I don't think anyone would begrudge accidental benefactors IF everyone who was eligible were receiving it too.  It's just extra galling for those who fell through the cracks this year that they should be entitled but can't get it, when some people not actually entitled are getting it.

Thank you for investigating this MSE - if nothing changes, the same people will keep falling through the cracks every year.

Jinxedcookie

I have rung the helpline today. I do not qualify as I am not a high energy user according to the government. 

This does not take into account disability benefits, nor electricity used to heat my property which has been necessary with the past 2 months of subzero temperatures overnight. I was under the delusion that the Warm Home Discount was created to help cover these cold months. 

The electricity companies I have previously applied to have taken into account these needs and I have received the discount. Once again the government have worsened the lot of those with disabilities on a low income. 

MinnieMal

I received the discount over the last few years, amazingly when energy prices were a lot less, and now they have almost trebled I’m no longer eligible, unbelievable. I’m pension age, low income and receive council tax support. My semi detached house was built in 1938. When I moved in over 20 years ago I  had cavity wall insulation and double glazing installed however I am not in a position now to replace or upgrade either. After ringing the helpline (which I didn’t find particularly helpful), on 3 separate occasions, as I was trying to get my head round the new requirements to be eligible for the discount, I was told I was a low usage household, really, not sure how they can know that. 

I know I can sit in my daughters house for 2 or 3 hours without the heating on (it’s a fairly new build with presumably good insulation), I can only sit in my house for 10 minutes without feeling cold. When I asked the helpline how my home was assessed they said on homes within the surrounding area. Not sure that is a fair way of working it out as some are terraced, some only have 2 bedrooms. Let’s hope it’s assessed differently next year. 

jadex

For some, if you are renting privately for years from the same landlord, good luck to get them to pay for EPC to "apply" for Warm Home Discount.
To qualify you'd need to be on certain benefits which are then against clauses in rental agreement (no DSS).
House is the same as last year, 2 years ago, 3 years ago...well, worse, as everything is getting older and older and less efficient (like 25 years old boiler), no insulation, very draughty, yet computer said NO.

gbhxu

Could Martin add this to the complaint.

The length of time it takes to get WHD paid by your electricity company.

It took Eon Next over 2 months (3 electric bills) to credit WHD to my account after I'd received my letter from the government.

Some companies paid their customers before they received the government letter saying they'd qualified for WHD 

EssexHebridean

jadex said:

For some, if you are renting privately for years from the same landlord, good luck to get them to pay for EPC to "apply" for Warm Home Discount.
To qualify you'd need to be on certain benefits which are then against clauses in rental agreement (no DSS).
House is the same as last year, 2 years ago, 3 years ago...well, worse, as everything is getting older and older and less efficient (like 25 years old boiler), no insulation, very draughty, yet computer said NO.

BIB - it's been established that there is no requirement to have a current EPC for this - as there are other ways that the "property type", age and area can be confirmed. These are the only factors that the EPC is relevant for - it's nothing to do with the "EPC rating" at all. 

wild666

Some disabled people work, even in wheelchairs, and now they aren't eligible to receive the WHD. The government has increased the payment by £10 but loads of people who would have being eligible under the old system are now excluded because of one thing or another.
I think the old system said if a person earns less than a certain amount they could claim the WHD now it goes on energy efficiency of the property, as far as I'm aware, as well as on the benefits a person receives.
Someone moving into a new home that's highly efficient might not get it but someone in an older home in the next street gets it even though space and room size is exactly the same but their home was built in say the 60's or 70's.

I would go further and say the cold weather payment are not what they are intended to be because a person can have weather at zero or below for 6 days and the seventh day it 1 degrees and they don't get it even if they've had the heat on for 6 days that it was zero or below.

wild666

People can be low users because they have being eligible but not got the WHD in previous years. They could be low users because they did not get the WHD in previous years so used less electric and gas in winter when it was cold. After being rejected a couple of times some will think it's not worth it and not apply, whereas now it's automatic, before you had to apply and it could be months before the person finds out that they are receiving the WHD or not so they aren't using the heating until they know the outcome. If successful they turn the heating on until the WHD money is used up and if not they don't use the heating at all.

Spoonie_Turtle

wild666 said:

Some disabled people work, even in wheelchairs, and now they aren't eligible to receive the WHD. The government has increased the payment by £10 but loads of people who would have being eligible under the old system are now excluded because of one thing or another.
I think the old system said if a person earns less than a certain amount they could claim the WHD now it goes on energy efficiency of the property, as far as I'm aware, as well as on the benefits a person receives.
Someone moving into a new home that's highly efficient might not get it but someone in an older home in the next street gets it even though space and room size is exactly the same but their home was built in say the 60's or 70's.

Please read the posts above, it does not - it's based on age, type and size (and therefore hypothetical efficiency/energy requirement rather than actual).

In our village one home built in the 90s has an energy efficiency rating of F, immediately proving the system is inaccurate in its assumptions.

Previously people had to both earn a low amount AND have a vulnerability - disability, young child, or pensioner.  Now the vulnerability requirement has been replaced with the property criterion.

(Incidentally wheelchair use is not, in itself, an indication of severity of disability.  Plenty of healthy and capable wheelchair users work, while many other non-wheelchair users are too ill to do so.  The WHD isn't about whether people can work or not, it's about whether they are, for any reason, on a low income.)

leitmotif

I'm disabled, on a low income and can't work away from home, so I work at home and have to heat my house throughout the day in the winter rather than sit in a warm office that someone else is paying to heat. But because my small flat is deemed not high cost to heat, I'm no longer eligible for the WHD.

I do understand that it would be hard to make time spent at home versus time spent away from home a factor, but they could infer from the fact that someone's on PIP that their costs are likely higher.