It was reported in the Guardian on Monday 17th June that Lambeth Council have delayed passing on a £1m heating subsidy to Lambeth residents.
Lambeth Council’s estates are heated by communal heat networks, with the cost added on to the weekly rental bill for Lambeth tenants, and onto the yearly service charge for leaseholders. Electricity is supplied and paid for separately.
It has been reported that Lambeth Council failed to reflect the government’s Energy Bills Discount Scheme, which launched last year, to cap price rises for heating network customers, which should have reduced household charges by about 25%.
Stephen Knight, the director of Heat Trust, told the Guardian that he had repeatedly asked the council to factor in the subsidy when calculating energy charges last year. The discount was finally secured when Knight involved the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero. (It also botched its application to the scheme according to the Heat Trust).
Residents have only now been informed that they are entitled to a share of a £1m subsidy, after a year of lobbying by Heat Trust. The sum will be retrospectively applied to the bills from the last financial year. Leaseholders will have to wait until September to receive the credit.
The EBDS discount has been applied to Lambeth’s tenants’ rent accounts and amounted to around 10% of the bill for the year. For leaseholders, we’ve been told it will be added to the account in September when the annual service charge is notified. PRERA have emailed Lambeth Service Change department for further information.
Further information
Guardian reporting delay in subsidy
Guardian reporting energy cost rise
Communal heat networks provide estates with heating and hot water from a central generator. They are supposed to offer energy and cost savings, however residents have to pay a set sum regardless of consumption and are unable to switch supplier to find cheaper deals. Heat networks are unregulated and bills are not subject to Ofgem price caps.
In April the government announced plans to regulate communal heat networks and to bring the protections for the 50,000 communal heat network customers into line with the rest of the energy sector.
Heat Trust
Heat Trust acts as a consumer champion for the heat networks sector, They are not a campaign organisation, a charity, or an advice service, and can’t give legal advice or intervene directly in disputes between individual consumers and their heat suppliers.
Lambeth Council are not registered with the Heat Trust, which has a voluntary standards code.
You can email the Heat Trust at info@heattrust.org with any queries, feedback or media requests about Heat Trust or our voluntary consumer-protection Scheme for GB heat networks.