Warm Home Discount roll-out planned for winter 2025/26 with millions more eligible – here's what we know

This announcement comes as energy regulator Ofgem confirmed today (Tuesday 25 February) that its Energy Price Cap, which two-thirds of households are on, will rise by 6.4% from 1 April 2025.

To summarise in brief, here's MoneySavingExpert.com founder Martin Lewis:

Here's more detail on what you need to know about the changes...

Warm Home Discount – who currently gets it

Currently, if you live in England and Wales you qualify for the Warm Home Discount if you either:

• Get the Guarantee Credit element of Pension Credit.

• Are on a means-tested benefit and have (or are deemed to have) 'high energy costs'.

If you live in Scotland, you currently qualify if you either:

• Get the Guarantee Credit element of Pension Credit.

• Are on a means-tested benefit in Scotland and/ or meet your energy supplier's criteria for the scheme.

The means-tested benefits are as follows:

- Child Tax Credit or Working Tax Credit, provided your household income falls below a certain threshold.
- Housing Benefit.
- Income-related Employment and Support Allowance (ESA).
- Income-based Jobseeker's Allowance (JSA).
- Income Support.
- The 'Savings Credit' element of Pension Credit.
- Universal Credit.

The £150 is typically deducted from your electricity bill, but you may be able to get the discount on your gas bill instead, as long as your supplier provides both your gas and electricity.

For further details, see our Warm Home Discount guide. There is no equivalent scheme in Northern Ireland.

More people should qualify in winter 2025/26

Under the Government's proposals, all households in receipt of means-tested benefits would be eligible for the Warm Home Discount. So...

• In England and Wales: The 'high energy costs' criteria would be removed.

• In Scotland: The level of spending available for suppliers to allocate would be increased by a proportionate amount to that in England and Wales.

There are no plans to change the qualifying criteria of being on the Guarantee Credit element of Pension Credit, while the means-tested benefits will also remain the same.

Eligibility criteria for the Warm Home Discount in England and Wales was shaken up in winter 2022/23. At the time, MoneySavingExpert.com wrote to the then Energy Minister, who promised to look at complaints after we highlighted that 10,000s of people may be falling through cracks in the new eligibility criteria.

This was partly due to high energy usage not being assessed using bills or energy efficiency and instead being calculated using data from the Valuation Office Agency to determine the size, age and type of home you live in. See our guide for full info on how "high energy costs" are calculated under the scheme.

The scheme may also be extended to other currently excluded groups

If you permanently live in a park home in England, Wales or Scotland, you probably don't have a direct electricity account with a UK energy company. But you can still get the Warm Home Discount through a separate industry-led scheme, which is application-based.

As part of its proposals, the Government is looking at widening the scope of this separate scheme to include other currently excluded groups, for example housing association and private tenants supplied electricity via a landlord, and people living on houseboats at residential moorings. This would also take force for winter 2025/26.

A bigger shake-up to Warm Home Discount is expected beyond this winter

The full proposals are out for consultation today until 24 March 2025. If they go ahead as planned, the Government says it would take the total number of households that would receive the discount next winter up to an estimated 6.1 million.

The Government will then consult on the future of the scheme beyond 2026 later this year. In today's consultation document it states: "We are currently considering more substantial changes to the Warm Home Discount Scheme to improve the design of the scheme beyond the current regulations which expire in 2026."