Liquid fuels trade association, the UK and Ireland Fuel Distributors Association (UKIFDA) acknowledges the government announcement to provide a fixed payment of £100 to heating oil households across the UK this winter. Support to non-domestic customers will be announced shortly.
Compensating for the rising costs of alternative fuels such as heating oil, this additional financial support serves those that live in an area of the UK that is not on the gas grid and not able to receive support for their heating costs through the Energy Price Guarantee.
Commenting on the announcement, UKIFDA CEO Ken Cronin said: “We wholeheartedly welcome the need to support heating oil customers at this difficult time. A number of UKIFDA members have received calls today from their customers requesting further detail about the mechanism to receive these payments. However, it is not clear from the government announcement how the payment will be made or funded in practise.”
The structure of the heating oil market is very different to that for gas and electricity. The major difference being that heating oil customers do not have contracts with heating oil distributors and are therefore free to purchase oil from a number of local distributors, meaning customers are likely to have multiple accounts.
UKIFDA CEO Ken Cronin continues: “UKIFDA will be actively engaging with the government and our members over the next few days to iron out these practicalities and ensure a proper working mechanism is put in place. One that ensures oil households receive their payments swiftly and easily without putting an expensive and burdensome administrative process upon the oil distributors.
“We will update members and their customers in due course as we gain greater understanding.”
21st September 2022
