Help With Energy Bills and Debt in Wales

Around 340,000 households in Wales, 25% of all households, were in fuel poverty at the October 2024 reference point, with 63,000 of them (5%) in severe fuel poverty¹. That is the headline from the Welsh Government's modelled estimates, and it is the number that sits behind every scheme, helpline and grant described on this page.

Help in Wales comes from three directions. The Welsh Government funds home energy improvement and crisis support; local authorities administer payments and hold the Discretionary Assistance Fund; and free advice services, including Nest and the Citizens Advice consumer service, tell households what they can claim. Some of this is devolved and some is not, which is why a Welsh household cannot always use the same scheme as a household in England.

What counts as fuel poverty in Wales

Wales uses its own definition, and it is not the one used in England. A household is considered to be in fuel poverty if it needs to spend more than 10% of its income, including housing related benefits and net of council tax, on all household fuel use to maintain a satisfactory heating regime¹. The Welsh Government states the same threshold in its own policy documents: fuel poor households are those needing to pay more than 10% of their full household income to maintain a satisfactory heating regime⁷.

Below and above that line sit two further bands. A household needing to spend between 8 and 10% is classed as being at risk of fuel poverty, and any household having to spend more than 20% is defined as being in severe fuel poverty¹. The Welsh Government's Warm Homes impact assessment uses the same severe threshold: those paying more than 20% are considered to be in severe fuel poverty⁷.

Two supporting definitions matter for the figures. A lower income household is one whose income is less than 60% of the median household income in the UK before housing costs. A vulnerable household is one containing a person aged 60 or over, a dependent child or children under 16, a single person under 25, or a person living with a long-term illness or who is disabled¹.

The heating standard behind all of this is specific. For vulnerable households the satisfactory heating regime is 23°C in the living room and 18°C in other rooms, required for 16 hours in a 24-hour period. For all other households it is 21°C in the living room and 18°C in other rooms for nine hours in every 24-hour period on weekdays, and 16 hours in a 24-hour period on weekends¹.

The 2024 estimates were modelled using the Building Research Establishment Domestic Energy Model, with October 2024 chosen as the reference point because it falls in line with the energy price cap reviews¹. One caution applies to every comparison on this page: due to differences in methodology, the 2024 modelled estimates of fuel poverty cannot be directly compared with previous figures, though broad comparisons can be made¹. A new Housing Survey is planned for 2027-28 to provide more up-to-date raw data¹.

How many households are affected, and who is most exposed

The October 2024 estimates put around 340,000 households (25%) in Wales in fuel poverty, including 63,000 (5%) in severe fuel poverty, with 215,000 (16%) at risk of fuel poverty¹. Within lower income households the picture is far sharper: around 195,000 lower income households (83%) were in fuel poverty, 56,000 (24%) in severe fuel poverty, and 28,000 (12%) at risk¹. Among vulnerable households, 198,000 (17%) were at risk and 46,000 (4%) in severe fuel poverty¹.

Who is exposed is not evenly spread. Single-person households were the most affected by fuel poverty, accounting for 55% of all fuel-poor households¹. Dwelling type matters: rates ranged from 23% of those living in detached homes to 28% of those living in end of terrace homes being fuel poor, and households living in dwellings rated EPC bands A to C (15%) were the least likely to be fuel poor¹. Households with two adults and children had a fuel poverty rate of 8%¹.

The fuel used for heating is the single biggest dividing line. An estimated 22% of households that used mains gas for heating were classed as being in fuel poverty, compared with 53% of those using electricity and 30% of those using other types of fuel¹⁰. That gap is the clearest evidence that being off the gas grid, or heating with electricity, is itself a risk factor in Wales.

Earlier estimates show how fast the position moved. The Welsh Government's fuel poverty measure estimated that 45% of Welsh households could be in fuel poverty following the April 2022 price increase, equivalent to 614,000 households¹¹. In 2021, 3% of all households (38,000) were living in severe fuel poverty and 11% (153,000) were at risk¹². Going further back, an estimated 144,504 households were at risk of being in fuel poverty in Wales in 2018, spending between 8% and 10% of household income on fuel costs⁹.

Homes in Wales are responsible for 27% of all energy consumed and 15% of all demand-side greenhouse gas emissions, which is why domestic energy sits at the centre of Welsh policy¹⁴. Electricity consumption represents approximately 16% of Wales' estimated 92.8 TWh total energy consumption¹⁵.

The Welsh Government's help with home energy bills

The Welsh Government directs households to its own support pages for help with home energy bills if they live in Wales, and this is separate from the UK government routes that apply in England¹⁶. Local councils may also offer support with home or business energy bills, so a household that has already checked the national schemes should still ask its own authority¹⁸.

On the home improvement side, the Welsh Government runs the Warm Homes programme. The Nest scheme provides funding for home energy improvements, and applications are handled directly by the service⁴. The Development Bank of Wales runs Green Homes Wales, which helps homeowners in Wales to improve their homes with energy efficiency upgrades²⁰. These are improvement schemes rather than bill payments: they reduce what a household needs to buy, rather than paying for what it has already used.

Crisis support has been delivered through several routes. The Welsh Government announced a package of help for people facing soaring fuel costs, including a Heat Fund that would help an estimated 2,000 households across Wales²¹. A later cost of living package included the £200 Winter Fuel Support Scheme payment²². The Fuel Voucher Scheme provided top up vouchers for customers on prepayment meters and a new crisis service for households off the gas grid unable to afford gas bottles or filling their oil tank, log store or coal bunker²³.

The Energy Company Obligation has delivered at scale in Wales: 155,891 households (5.4% of the GB total households receiving measures) benefited in the six years since the scheme was introduced, approximately 20,000 households in Wales annually¹³. Ofgem describes ECO as a scheme that funds energy efficiency improvements for homeowners and tenants²⁴.

The Winter Fuel Support Scheme: £200 payments and how it worked

The Winter Fuel Support Scheme was a Welsh Government scheme that enabled households to claim a one-off payment of £200 to provide support towards paying winter fuel bills². It was aimed at people on low incomes, providing a non-repayable £200 cash payment towards their energy bills²⁵. The Welsh Government later described it as having provided a £200 payment for eligible households to help meet the cost of essential bills over the winter period²⁶.

The scheme opened in December 2021. When it was first announced, eligible people in Wales could claim a one-off £100 payment from their local authority towards winter fuel bills²⁷. By February 2022 the Welsh Government confirmed the £200 Winter Fuel Support Scheme payment²⁵, and the scheme remained open in that financial year with applications to be received by a local council by 28 February².

Applications were made through local government, not through suppliers. Information on how to apply was available via local authority webpages, and local authorities contacted eligible households across Wales where they could identify potential eligibility to invite applications. Anyone not contacted could still submit a claim via their local authority's website²⁷.

The scheme's own impact assessment confirms the measure it was built on: the Welsh fuel poverty measure of 10% of income on fuel bills¹¹. The same assessment estimated that 45% of Welsh households could be in fuel poverty following the April 2022 price increase, which is the context in which the £200 payment was set¹¹.

Free advice services you can call

Nest is the Welsh Government's free home energy service. Householders can call Nest for free on 0808 808 2244, Monday to Friday from 9am to 6pm, or request a callback online⁴. The service handles applications for home energy efficiency improvements as well as advice, so a call can lead to a survey rather than just a conversation¹⁹.

The Local Energy Advice Programme offers a free telephone advice service to help with benefits, money and bill problems, on 0800 060 7567²⁸. It is a telephone service rather than a visit, and it covers the money side of an energy bill as well as the energy side.

For benefit take-up specifically, AdviceLink Cymru's Claim What's Yours helpline helps people access benefits, pensions, help with care costs and council tax reductions they may be entitled to⁶. This matters because unclaimed benefit entitlement is often the largest single sum available to a household in fuel poverty, and it is not an energy scheme at all.

If you live in England or Wales and would like advice on energy efficiency or about how to get help with energy bills with schemes like the Warm Home Discount Scheme, the Simple Energy Advice website offers impartial energy efficiency advice²⁴. Impartial is the operative word: none of these services sells tariffs or takes a commission from a supplier.

Citizens Advice consumer service in Wales

Citizens Advice's free consumer service can help you if you have problems with your energy bills or supply, and it covers people in England or Wales²⁹. Citizens Advice offers information and support on a range of topics, including struggling to pay bills, problems with your energy supplier or energy supply, saving energy at home, and getting a better energy deal¹⁷.

The consumer service number is 0808 223 1133⁵. It is the route for a dispute rather than a grant: contact your energy supplier first if you have a problem relating to late, incorrect or missing bills, back billing, being overcharged, a faulty meter, poor customer service, or a refusal to refund credit from your account²⁹.

Where a complaint is serious, the service can escalate it. Citizens Advice may refer you to the Extra Help Unit if you need support with a difficult or urgent complaint, cannot deal with your energy supplier on your own due to personal circumstances, are considered vulnerable, or are at risk of being disconnected from an energy supply⁵. That referral route is the main formal protection for a Welsh household facing disconnection.

Citizens Advice is also the recognised consumer advice body for heat network consumers in England and Wales, alongside any related, qualifying consumer advice bodies³¹. Households on a communal or district heat network therefore have the same advice route as households on a standard supply.

For households in Northern Ireland the position is different: Advice NI and the Consumer Council for Northern Ireland handle energy advice and complaints, and suppliers there refer customers who are struggling to pay bills to organisations like Advice NI³². A Welsh household that moves across the Irish Sea cannot use the same helpline.

Help if you are off-supply or in fuel debt

If you are struggling to pay for energy or think you may get into difficulty, you can ask your supplier to agree a payment plan, a payment break or a reduction, review your payments and debt repayments, and give you access to hardship funds¹⁶. Suppliers can also reassess or cut debt repayment and bill payments for domestic customers in financial trouble³². These are negotiated arrangements rather than automatic entitlements, and the terms depend on the supplier.

Off the mains gas grid, the routes are different again. The Fuel Bank Foundation provides fuel vouchers for deliveries of oil or gas for those not connected to the mains gas network, and the Welsh Government already provides support for those experiencing fuel poverty with purchasing off-grid fuel through the Discretionary Assistance Fund⁶. The Fuel Voucher Scheme's crisis service was aimed at households off the gas grid unable to afford gas bottles or filling their oil tank, log store or coal bunker²³.

Eligibility for the voucher route is tightly drawn. Households must be referred by a referral partner, be experiencing intense financial crisis and be at immediate risk of self-disconnection, or have already self-disconnected, or be making choices causing significant detriment in order to fund energy²³. The partner network enabled the Foundation to distribute approximately 49,000 vouchers, providing support to approximately 117,000 individuals depending on household size²³.

The wrap-around element matters as much as the voucher. The scheme funds expansion of the partner network to support wrap-around energy and savings advice to avoid dependency and repeat requests for help, including onward referral, working alongside the Single Advice Fund providers²³. In other words, the voucher is meant to open a door to advice rather than close a gap for one week.

Support for small businesses and microbusinesses

Household schemes do not cover a business, even a one-person one. Small businesses and microbusinesses in Wales are directed to Business Wales for help with their energy bills, and to the relevant UK government business support helpline¹⁶. Your local council may also offer support with home or business energy bills¹⁸.

The distinction is not cosmetic. A sole trader working from a home office is still a domestic customer for the supply to that home, but a business premises with its own meter is not, and the Warm Home Discount, the Winter Fuel Support Scheme and the Discretionary Assistance Fund were not built for it. Business energy contracts also sit outside the domestic price cap.

On the efficiency side, the Development Bank of Wales runs Green Homes Wales for homeowners, and separately advises businesses on retrofit, including choosing a retrofit coordinator²⁰. Carmarthenshire Council publishes guidance on minimum energy efficiency standards for business premises, which is the regulatory backdrop for commercial landlords³³. For a microbusiness, the practical route is Business Wales first, then the council, then the UK business support helpline.

What the fuel poverty figures mean for your household's independence

The Welsh figures describe a specific kind of dependence. A household in fuel poverty is not short of energy; it is short of the money to buy it at the price on offer, from a supplier it did not choose the infrastructure for, through a grid it does not control. The 2024 estimates show how much of that is structural: 83% of lower income households were in fuel poverty, and 53% of households heating with electricity were in fuel poverty compared with 22% on mains gas¹.

That gap is the independence question in one line. A household on mains gas is exposed to wholesale gas prices. A household heating with electricity is exposed to electricity prices, which carry the policy costs and levies built into every unit. A household off the gas grid entirely is exposed to whatever its oil supplier or bottled gas merchant charges that month, with no price cap at all. The Discretionary Assistance Fund and the Fuel Bank Foundation exist precisely because that last group has no other backstop⁶.

The improvement schemes point the other way. ECO delivered measures to 155,891 households in Wales over six years¹³, and Nest and Green Homes Wales fund fabric improvements that reduce the units a home needs in the first place⁴. The Climate Change Committee's advice to Welsh Government notes that 14% of Welsh households were in fuel poverty in 2021, and that by 2033 nearly a quarter of existing homes in Wales are expected to be heated by low-carbon electrified heating, predominately heat pumps³⁴. That shift moves households off gas and onto electricity, which makes the electricity price, and the efficiency of the home, more important than ever.

What remains dependent is the advice and payment layer itself. The Winter Fuel Support Scheme closed in 2022². The Fuel Voucher Scheme was a crisis response²³. The Discretionary Assistance Fund and the Fuel Bank Foundation are the standing routes, and both work by referral⁶. A Welsh household's practical independence therefore rests on three things it can act on: claiming the benefit entitlement it is owed through Claim What's Yours⁶, using the free advice services before a debt becomes a disconnection risk⁴, and reducing the energy the home needs through Nest or Green Homes Wales⁴.