OT: Energy boost payment for oil users

[Davey]

I have received news that the long-awaited Energy Supplement, or whatever it's called, (AFP) for those thousands of us in East Anglia who have no gas supply and have to rely on oil for our heat, is finally going to happen. In February, every household that qualifies will automatically get £200 from the government, paid via the household's electricity supplier.

"Most households eligible for the AFP support in Great Britain, will receive payment automatically via their electricity supplier in February, with no need to take any action."

But how does the electricity supplier know that I use oil for heating? It doesn't mention that. Does it ask every gas supplier in the area (British Gas?) if it supplies me?

[Theo]

"Alternative Fuel Payments (domestic)

This scheme is intended to deliver a one-off payment of £100 to UK households who are not on the mains gas grid and therefore use alternative fuels, such as heating oil, to heat their homes. Powers will enable the government to deliver support via electricity bills in both GB and NI, under a similar delivery model to the Energy Bills Support Scheme. The payment will ensure that a typical customer using heating oil does not face a higher rate of growth in their heating costs since last winter, in comparison to those using mains gas who are supported by the Energy Price Guarantee. The government will set out the timing of this payment soon."

and also: so it seems to relate to the absence of gas, rather than the presence of oil/wood/electric heating. I imagine the presence or otherwise of gas can be determined by linking the database of gas meter points with that of electric meter points - which doesn't involve asking all the suppliers, since the networks will have that information.

This is enabling legislation for data sharing:

not the actual direction itself, which it seems hasn't happened yet)

Theo

[Davey]

"Soon" has finally arrived, and it is £200 rather than £100, which is better than nothing. But there is no indication I can find about how these eligible households are to be identified.

[John J]

So you get the money knocked off your electricity bill - what's the problem? Use the money you would have paid to your electricity supplier to put towards your oil bill.

[Davey]

It's not a problem, I didn't say it was. All I was asking was how does the electricity company know that I am eligible? Not the same thing at all.

[The Natural Philosopher]

I've just spent £1000 to not even half fill my oil tank.

[Martin Brown]

It would seem to fly in the face of the data protection act.

I can see no convincing reason why my *electricity* supplier should be told that my property has no mains gas supply. They can probably infer this from the fact that I cannot obtain a dual fuel discount!

That said our Village Hall buys its electricity from British Gas! (they turned out to be cheapest) There is *no* mains gas here.

[Andy Burns]

A certin level of data-sharing is probably included in the T&C of energy company contracts, if I query U-Switch they know my existing supplier is EdF, but they don't know which tariff or what my usage level is.

Similarly when suppliers were going pop on a weekly basis a year or so ago, OFGEM could pass on details to the suppliers of last resort, and the new suppliers could take-over exiting direct debits etc.

[Brian Gaff]

No, but I'm sure the data is held somewhere. One thing that does annoy me a bit is that I've just had 500 quid for winter fuel and cost of living, but to be perfectly frank, I did not need it,since I am on fixed price deals for a couple of years yet. However there is no way to simply say, I don't need it right now ask me again next year. Brian

[Andy Burns]

The same levels of support are unlikely to be available next year, if the price shock is likely to hit you in the future, take it now and save it until you need it ...

[Theo]

Why does knowing that 99 Acacia Avenue does or doesn't have a gas supply contrevene the data protection act? What personal data is being processed here?

There is explicit legislation for this data sharing, anyway:

(ie companies are being told what to do by the government, rather than deciding what to do of themselves)

I think they can query last year's usage, at least I've seen that on some comparison sites. And they can query whether it's E7 or not, which is a feature of the meter not the customer.

That is typically covered as business continuity: if your supplier (of anything) goes bust, the customers can be taken on by somebody else and they obviously need to know who their customers are to be able to serve them. There are usually explicit clauses in privacy policies to cover that.

Theo

[Andy Bennett]

Count yourself lucky - heating oil is cheaper than gas. Locally it's

90p/litre at the moment and with an energy content of 10kWh/litre that's only 9p/kWh. Capped price for gas is 10.4p/kWh at the moment.

[Andrew]

I deliberately supplied meter readings that were much higher than usual last October and the previous quarter to do my own 'smoothing' of charges.

[Andy Burns]

aka "fraud"?