Warm Home Discount for park home sites and HMO's

[michelle cheeseman]

Dear all,

Has anyone yet come across how the energy companies plan to issue the Warm Home Discount to eligible residents living in park home sites or HMO's that don't have individual meters/accounts as the electricity is supplied to the management of the park home site or HMO and re-sold to the residents?

In West Sussex we have lots of park home sites and HMO's set up in this way, and I have already had queries from residents. They have the same right to apply for / receive the discount as anyone else deemed eligible. I've had no response as yet from Ofgem or any of the energy companies that I've contacted and already have queries coming in from residents.

Any help or advice would be much appreciated.

Thanks

Michelle Cheeseman
West Sussex Fuel Poverty Co-ordinator
01903 737537
michelle.cheeseman@arun.gov.uk

[ALEO Admin]

Hi Michelle

I've had the following response to you enquiry emailed through to me from Valentine Mulholland of EDF Energy:

Rob

My colleague has passed your email to me as I lead EDF Energy’s work with Ofgem and DECC on the Warm Home discount. I am afraid that Warm Home discount rebates can only be paid to households who have an electricity account with one of the participating suppliers. This is reflected in the Regulations so I am surprised that Ofgem were not able to clarify that point.

Best regards

Valentine Mulholland

Energy Policy Manager

EDF Energy

Hope that helps.

[murrelr]

I guess the question needs to be asked of Ofgem 'will people in this situation be able to get some other help, along the lines of what was in place before the WHD - namely a social tariff?'.

Richard Murrell
Derby City Council

[ALEO Admin]

Below is another response that has been emailed through to me via Steve Ives at DECC:

Rob,

I picked this notification up and passed it to our Fuel Poverty team. The following is the response to Michelle:

"Hi Michelle,

Your query regarding Warm Home Discount and Park Homes posted on the Carbon Action Network was passed to me by Steve Ives.

The consultation for WHD did consider the issue of whether to extend eligibility to customers who do not pay their electricity bill directly, e.g. who pay it through their rent on a caravan park or park home.

However, due to the administrative complexity of identifying and verifying these individual circumstances, ensuring the benefit of the rebate was made available to the customer and identifying a means of making a payment, it was decided not to include these individuals in the scheme. I appreciate this is disappointing for some people and we have spoken to quite a few people living in Park Homes about it.

Do get back to me if you have any questions.

Regards

William

Many thanks to Steve and William for this.

Let me know if you'd like me to send you William's contact details.

[LJWiltshire1]

In Wiltshire, I have been asked by a Member to look into this issue again - she is considering an equalities case against Ofgem and/or DECC and has discussed with the local MP to such effect. The original posts below were some time ago - has anyone since had any more experiences / complaints / comments from either Members or park home/HMO residents?

[ALEO Admin]

Hi, thanks for posting.

I have received the following three emailed responses on this, which I shall post anonymously but send the full emails to you directly:

"We have the same problem. We have two elderly families living on one of our traveller sites who are eligible to the Warm Homes Discount but cannot claim it because the bill payer "provides" the electricity to the traveller site. This has been going on for the last two years and we have had two very cold winters. Hopefully the threat of an equalities case against Ofgem/DECC may put the pressure on. It is blatant discrimination and that is what I would be suing for if I were a MP.

I should also add that the traveller site gets their electricity at commercial rates which I believe is lower than the domestic rate. However, they use more electricity because their caravans are totally energy inefficient."

Secondly:
I raised it with a utility company. They pointed to the consultation response which said that identifying and getting it to people without a meter would be ‘too administratively complex.’ Because the utility didn’t have to do it therefore, they would not.

and finally the attachments, below, were emailed through to me with the message:
"these attachments may not answer the query fully but would certainly be of interest to the author of the Q."

Many thanks to those who have responded. Please feel free to contribute directly to the forum or, alternatively, email me with your comments if you would prefer me to post on your behalf at rob.leeson@can.uk.net

Best regards
Rob Leeson
CAN National Secretariat