Energy bills and support

Contact your energy supplier as soon as you can if you are worried about paying your energy bills or think you won’t be able to afford them.

Your supplier must take into account your circumstances and situation and offer help.

Your supplier must work with you to agree on a payment plan you can afford based on what is called your ‘ability to pay’.

This includes reviewing a plan you have agreed before.

You can ask for:

• A review of your payments and debt repayments
• Payment breaks (if available) or reductions
• More time to pay
• Access to hardship funds if available

Many energy suppliers offer specific grants from trust funds which may be able to support.

The British Gas Energy Trust will consider applications for grants from anyone, regardless of who your energy supplier is.

They require you to seek professional money advice first and fund a number of local advice centres across England, Scotland and Wales which specialise in this.

The Priority Service Register (PSR)  is a great way for you or someone in your household to get extra support when it comes to your utlity supply.

The PSR is a free service provided by all utility companies. If you're signed up, you could be eligible for everything from bills in braille to advance notice of planned power cuts.

You could also receive priority support in an emergency.

This means that, if you're medically dependent on your utility supply or you have restricted mobility, your utility company will call yo in an emergency to explain what's happened and check if you need help. You could also get additional support during an outage, including bottled water delivered to your door. 

Winter fuel payments are available to those born on or before 25 September 1956.

Available if you’re getting certain benefits or Support for Mortgage Interest and if the average temperature in your area is recorded as, or forecast to be, zero degrees Celsius or below over seven consecutive days.

You’ll get £25 for each seven-day period of very cold weather between 1 November and 31 March 2023.

If you’re running out of gas and electricity, your supplier provides an emergency credit facility which you can access automatically via your meter. If this is still insufficient, then you can call your supplier and explain the situation as they are required to offer some amount of additional support credit to keep you on supply or return you to supply where appropriate.

This can be if you are struggling to pay (Emergency credit), because your top-up points are closed (Friendly-hours credit) or because you are in a vulnerable situation (Additional Support Credit).

In most cases, any temporary credit will have to be paid back when you next top up, though you can ask your supplier to spread out the cost in a payment plan, based on what you can afford to pay.

If you're unable to afford to top up your prepayment meter, you can ask your local council or a food bank for a fuel voucher which may be able to provide one.

Our Financial Inclusion Team can help you access a voucher.