Some households in Britain may begin to see their energy bills rise due to new changes coming into force on Sunday, January 1.
However, not every household will be affected by the changes equally and differences will occur depending on which part of the country they live in and how they pay for gas and electricity. The hike will hit hardest for those who live in North Wales and Merseyside who don't pay with direct debit.
For this group, bills are set to rise by more than £5 per month between January and April. Meanwhile, bills will decrease for those in the north of England - averaging at around £3.90 less. The changes are made to the amount a person's energy suppliers charge per unit of gas and electricity they supply.
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The monthly charges are calculated based on hat the average household uses in a year - 4,200 units of electricity and 12,000 units of gas - and assume that usage is spread evenly across the year. Beacuse people use more gas in the winter, the actual figures may be larger.
For those who pay on standard credit, bills will go up by around £3.90 a month on average, ranging from around £2.60 in the north of England to £5.60 in the Mersey and North Wales region. Prepayment meter customers will see an average bill increase of £1.50, while those who pay direct debit will only see an increase of 2p.
The system works differently for customers on certain types of tariff, such as Economy 7.
For these customers “suppliers have flexibility to apply slightly different discounts to the individual rates within the tariff, helping to balance out the reduction of more expensive day rates with cheaper night-time electricity rates. Each supplier will approach this differently”, the Government said.
The Ofgem price cap has always been set at slightly different levels based on where someone lives and how they pay.
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