The Warm Home Discount gets you £140 off your electricity bill to help with energy costs. Find out if your supplier is in the scheme and how to apply.
Millions of households can apply for a Warm Home Discount grant of £140 to pay towards their electricity costs.
It’s easy to apply, and loads of energy companies take part.
The discount is added to your energy account to pay for extra costs you face over the winter months.
Read on to find out when applications open and if your supplier takes part.
In this article
What is Warm Home Discount scheme?
With the Warm Home Discount Scheme, you receive a one-off payment of £140 directly as a credit on your electricity bill.
It doesn’t matter if you have a smart meter, pay monthly, pre-pay, or pay as you go energy meter.
The payments show as a discount on your energy bills rather than paid as cash to you. Or, if you have a pre-pay meter, you will get a top-up voucher.
If you have your gas bill and electricity with the same supplier, they may allow you to add it to your gas meter.
Your energy supplier will pay the credit into your energy bills account any time from October to March.
The payment is due to rise to a £150 one-off discount, but the government has not confirmed the date yet.
Also see: 50 ways to save money on energy bills without switching
When does the 2022 Warm Home Discount scheme open?
The Warm Home Discount scheme officially starts in October 2022.
But many energy suppliers have opened their applications early.
Energy companies manage the applications on a first-come, first-served basis.
How do I apply for Warm Home Discount?
Fuel poor customers
If you are on a low income and get certain means-tested benefits, you can apply as part of the “broader group scheme”.
Each supplier runs the broader group scheme with slightly different eligibility criteria and decides who can get the discount.
There are limited discounts, so you need to apply early.
You have to apply with your supplier directly (see below).
Fuel poor pensioners
As part of the core group, you need to receive the Guarantee Credit element of Pension Credit before the qualifying date in July 2022.
You should then automatically qualify and be eligible for the Warm Home Discount.
You don’t need to apply as the Department of Work and Pensions will write to you as part of the core group.
You will need to call their helpline by 28 February 2023 to confirm your details.
Which energy companies offer Warm Home Discount?
Here are the energy companies who offer the warm home discount for 2022/2023.
If your supplier has not opened applications, you may be able to register for an alert rather than having to check back.
Applications open
- –
Registration open
- –
Not open yet
- E (Gas and Electricity) – not open for applications
- E.ON (including NPower) – not open for applications
- Scottish Power – not open for applications
- British Gas – not open for applications
- British Gas Evolve – not open for applications
- EDF – not open for applications
- Boost – not open for applications
- Bulb – not open for applications
- Octopus Energy (including Affect Energy, Co-op Energy, London Power, M&S Energy, Qwest Energy, Roar Power) – not open for applications
- OVO Energy – not open for applications
- SSE (including Atlantic and Spark if you have been told you’re moving) – not open for applications
- Pure Planet (ceased trading, now see Shell Energy) – not open for applications
- Shell Energy (including Green Star Energy) – not open for applications
- Utility Warehouse – open for applications
- So Energy – not open
- Spark – not open (if you’ve not got a communication that you’re moving to SSE yet, apply with Spark)
- Utilita – not open for applications
Closed
- –
What if my energy company has gone bust?
If your energy company has gone bust, Ofgem, the energy regulator, will move you to a new supplier.
This process can take a couple of weeks.
If you applied for the Warm Home Discount before they went bust but didn’t get the payment, you would need to apply again with your new energy supplier.
If the new supplier doesn’t offer it, you can switch to a supplier who does.
Frequently asked questions about the Warm Home Discount
Since 2020, a supplier needs to have at least 150,000 customers to be part of the Warm Home Discount scheme.
Before this, the supplier needed to have more than 250,000 customers.
Some smaller suppliers can volunteer to be part of the scheme even if they have fewer customers.
Energy companies will apply the rebate to your account by 31 March. However, you need to apply well in advance just in case applications close early.
While millions of households are eligible, the number of discounts is limited. It’s best to apply early, so you don’t miss out.
The money is paid directly to your energy bill between October and March.
As part of the broader group, you need to apply for the Warm Home Discount each year to check you’re still eligible.
The energy suppliers fund the scheme.
Around 2.2 million households in Great Britain can apply for a Warm Home Discount.
Supplies aren’t able to transfer the Warm Home Discount between each other.
If you have applied for a Warm Home Discount, you need to stay with your supplier until the payment has been made. After this, you can look at switching suppliers without losing money.
The Warm Home Discount of £140 includes VAT. The rebate will show as £133.33 on your energy bill as it’s before VAT, and VAT will get added later.
Warm Home Discount eligibility
The scheme is run differently for each of the electricity suppliers.
To give you an idea of eligibility, for one provider, you need to be meet one of the following for the broader group:
- Income Related Employment Support Allowance;
- Income Based Jobseeker’s Allowance;
- Income Support; or
- receive Universal Credit and has earned income between zero and £1,349 in at least one of the twelve preceding assessment periods.
or, if the following apply you may also qualify, if
- Your total gross household income is less than £16,190
AND your household also meets at least one of the following criteria:
There is a child permanently living in your household who:
- is 5 years or under ; or
- is 18 years or under in full time education ; or
- Is entitled to free school meals;
You or another member of your household:
- receives Child Tax Credit or Working Tax Credit which includes a disability element or severe disability element, disabled child element or severely disabled child element or family element or UC Equivalent;
- receives an Income Related Benefit which includes a disabled child premium, disability premium, severe disability premium, enhanced disability premium or UC Equivalent;
- is in receipt of the limited Capability for work and work-related activity as construed in accordance with regulations 39 and 40 of the Universal Credit Regulations 2013(a);
- receives Pensioner Premium, Higher Pensioner Premium or Enhanced Pensioner Premium;
- receives Disability Living Allowance (DLA), Personal Independence Payment (PIP); Incapacity Benefit or Attendance Allowance;
- is aged 65 or over;
- your household’s annual energy spend is, more than 10% of the annual income.
Criteria from Scottish Power
Electricity suppliers may need to see evidence to support your broader group application.
Other energy providers might use different qualifying eligibility, so check with them to be sure.
2020 Warm Home Discount Suppliers
The following suppliers were part of the scheme for the winter of 2020 to 2021. However, some of them have since stopped trading or have moved under the ownership of another company.
- Affect Energy – see Octopus Energy
- Atlantic – see SSE
- Boost
- Bristol Energy – only if you’re eligible for the ‘core group’
- British Gas
- British Gas Evolve (formerly British Gas X)
- Bulb Energy
- Co-op Energy – see Octopus Energy
- E (Gas and Electricity)
- E.ON
- Ecotricity – only if you’re eligible for the ‘core group’
- EDF Energy
- Green Energy UK (GEUK) – only if you’re eligible for the ‘core group’
- iSupply Energy – see EDF Energy
- Green Star Energy – see Shell Energy
- London Power – see Octopus Energy
- Lumo – see OVO
- M&S Energy – see Octopus Energy
- npower
- nPower Select – see E.ON Next
- Octopus Energy
- OVO
- Qwest Energy – see Octopus Energy
- Roar Power – see Octopus Energy
- Scottish Hydro – see SSE
- ScottishPower
- Shell Energy
- So Energy
- Southern Electric – see SSE
- Spark
- SSE
- Swalec – see SSE
- Symbio Energy
- Tonik Energy – see ScottishPower
- Utility Warehouse
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Liz says
If we can’t apply for the winter fuel discount due to being in limbo, we may miss out. It’s not fair that we should be ‘punished’ for reasons beyond our control.
Will there be any safety net in place.
Naomi Willis says
I’m not sure where in the limbo you are? If you are waiting on a new supplier, it should be sorted in less than two weeks from when the announcement was made. Fingers crossed they offer the WHD (and they can do you a good deal on energy) so you don’t have to switch again too soon. As a lot of people are in the same position, there will be lots who aren’t able to apply straight away.