Take action if you have unredeemed vouchers

Renfrewshire residents with prepayment meters have been advised to contact their energy supplier if they have missing or unredeemed rebate vouchers as a deadline passes.

Advice Direct Scotland – which runs the national energy advice service energyadvice.scot – urged households to take action even if their vouchers have expired.

Households with traditional prepayment meters should have received five of six vouchers under the UK Government’s energy bill support scheme.

The prepayment vouchers are only valid for 90 days. December’s vouchers must be claimed by today.

Vouchers worth £67 were also sent out by post to prepayment meter customers from the start of this month, as the final instalment of the support scheme.

Some consumers may have received an SMS text or email, depending on their supplier.

If a voucher does expire, customers can ask for it to be reissued. Suppliers should contact consumers if vouchers are not redeemed.

Recent figures show almost a third of Scottish households with prepayment meters have not redeemed their vouchers issued between October and December, meaning as much as £54 million of support has been unclaimed.

Most households will have £400 automatically taken off their electricity bills in six instalments across the winter, or will have the money added to their accounts.

However, those on traditional prepayment meters need the vouchers to get the discount.

Households with smart prepayment meters will be credited directly in the first week of each month.

Some suppliers allow customers to transfer support scheme payments from electricity to gas meters.