Citizens Advice published its response to a government consultation on amending the ECO4 order on 5 January 2026. The charity said it supports the intention to remove the risk of bill increases caused by supplier overspend during the Energy Company Obligation scheme, and agreed the order may need to change so ministers can pay suppliers directly from Exchequer funding1.
The consultation itself is not described in the response, and the government has not been reported as having set out a timetable for a decision. What the response addresses is the mechanism for recovering costs where a supplier has spent more than its obligation allows. Citizens Advice described passing those costs to billpayers as "a regressive way to address these costs" that would counteract efforts to bring energy bills down1.
"Citizens Advice supports the Government's intention to remove the risk of increases to energy bills as a result of supplier overspend during the ECO4 scheme"
The charity's support is qualified. It said it is concerned that Exchequer funding means "the taxpayer will be making retrospective payments towards the scheme", and that government "must carefully assess the efficiency of suppliers' spending on ECO4 to determine a fair level of payment"1. It also said retrospective payments for a former scheme must not affect the funding available for fuel poverty reduction in future, and that any payments to suppliers must not be drawn from the Warm Homes Plan budget, which it said "must be delivered in full"1.
The response lists what that full delivery covers: upgrades for those in fuel poverty, protection for consumers who make changes to their homes, and advice to help people navigate the process1. No figure for the value of supplier overspend, the likely Exchequer payment, or the Warm Homes Plan budget appears in the response. Those numbers have not been reported.
Why it matters for households
ECO4 is a supplier-funded obligation, which means its costs are recovered through energy bills. Where a supplier overspends against its target, the existing rules allow that cost to be passed on, so households pay more for the same scheme. Moving the recovery to general taxation shifts the cost from billpayers to taxpayers, who overlap heavily but are not identical groups. For a household, the practical difference is between a standing charge or unit rate that reflects scheme costs and a tax bill that does not.
The charity's warning concerns timing and accounting rather than the principle. Retrospective payment for work already done under a closed or closing scheme comes out of a current budget. If that budget is the one earmarked for fuel poverty measures, the effect is to fund past obligations at the expense of present ones. Households eligible for ECO4 or successor schemes would feel that through the availability of grants rather than through their bills.
The consultation sits within the wider process by which energy rules are proposed, decided and changed, and Citizens Advice's role as a statutory consumer body in that process is set out among the energy consumer bodies.
What happens next
No date has been reported for the government's response to the consultation or for any amendment to the ECO4 order. The response does not state when payments to suppliers would begin or how they would be assessed.