Northern Ireland householders are facing further price hikes in their energy bills this year.
The looming leap in energy bills is just the latest headache for hard-up households as the rising cost of living has already left customers struggling with everything from filling up the car to the weekly shop.
That is before, another leading energy supplier hikes prices for thousands of customers from today.
Read more: SSE Airtricity announces major price hike
A further price hike in gas bills has come into effect for 47,000 Firmus Energy customers in the greater Belfast area.
The company announced the 37% increase in April, meaning that the annual gas bill of a typical household with a credit meter will rise by about £330 per year.
Those customers with a prepayment gas meter (PAYG) will see their typical costs increase by around £325 per year.
Meanwhile a 16.31% rise in its Ten Towns network, announced in late March, will also affect about 55,000 customers from today.
Firmus has blamed global pressures including the war in Ukraine for the move with sustained increases in global wholesale gas prices but hopes to announce price decreases "as soon as we can possibly do so".
Just last week, Northern Ireland’s second largest electricity supplier, SSE Airtricity, announced it is upping customers’ electric bills by 33% with “increases in wholesale energy costs” blamed for the rise.
The Consumer Council says the SSE rise will mean people on their ‘Standard’ tariff for both credit meter and keypad (PAYG) meter will see an £248 increase in their bills to just over £1,000 a year.
SSE says the increase will be effective from June 1, “and means a typical customer will see costs rise by around £0.64 per day”.
The firm says they are also providing “additional supports for customers who have been adversely affected by the current energy crisis ”.
Budget Energy, Northern Ireland’s fourth largest electricity supplier, is also set to increase prices by 27% from 27 May.
A typical customer with a credit meter will see their bill rise by around £280 per year, while customers with a keypad (PAYG) meter will see a yearly increase of about £275.
The two companies - SSE and Budget Energy - announced electricity price increases in October 2021, meaning this increase is the second in six months.
Both of these latest increases will affect three in ten households, around 248,000 domestic customers.
Gas
On Tuesday, around 102,000 gas customers in Northern Ireland have been impacted by a further hike in price by the region’s largest supplier, Firmus Energy.
An increase of 16.31% is to be imposed from May 3, which is the company's fourth increase since last spring.
That will see a typical bill for a household with a credit meter increase by about £211 per year to £1,504.
Customers with a prepayment gas meter will see costs rise by around £201 per year to £1,432.
It comes after a 33.57% hike to the Ten Towns tariff by Firmus in February that would bring the average household gas bill to £1,293 a year.
In April 2021, the average bill was £518.
The Ten Towns Network area includes Antrim, Armagh, Ballymena, Ballymoney, Banbridge, Coleraine, Craigavon (including Lurgan and Portadown), Limavady, Derry, Newry and more than 25 other towns and villages in the surrounding areas.
A similar rise of 37% rise in prices in the Belfast area for Greater Belfast also comes into effect on Tuesday.
Last November, Firmus announced a 38% increase for the Ten Towns network after prices in the same area had already been increased by 35% in October.
Then, in December 2021, the company announced a 19.5% hike in Greater Belfast, three months after it announced an increase of 33%.
Meanwhile, SSE Airtricity increased its natural gas prices for households and businesses by 39% from April 1.
The increase impacted around 186,000 gas customers and marks the energy company's biggest rise in gas prices in their network since May 2011.
It means the yearly gas bill of a typical household with a credit meter rose by about £244 per year, while those with a prepayment gas meter seeing their typical costs increase by around £241 per year.
The firm also increased its gas prices by 21.8% in October 2021, adding about £112 to the average household bill.
Has your energy bill gone up recently? Let us know in the comments section
Electricity
Electricity suppliers have also been announcing price rises, the most recent by Electric Ireland which increased its prices by 30% from 1 May.
Northern Ireland's third largest supplier said the increase would mean a weekly increase of approximately £4.21 on an average residential electricity bill.
Electric Ireland, which has about 103,000 customers in Northern Ireland, said the move was due to "continued market volatility and unprecedented increases in wholesale energy costs".
It is the first tariff change announcement of this year but the fourth since August 2021.
The company announced a 10% price increase last August, a 3.7% increase in February 2021, and a 13.5% in November 2021.
Northern Ireland's largest energy supplier Power NI has increased its prices by almost 22% for its domestic electricity customers.
A lack of wind during last summer was also cited as a contributory factor, with lower rates of renewable electricity generation leading to a greater reliance on fossil fuel-fired power stations.
The 21.4% increase, which adds £2.51 to an average weekly household bill or £131 per year, came into effect on January 1.
The company had previously increased its prices by 6.9% in July 2021, adding about £41 a year to a typical household bill.
Other competitors have followed suit including SSE Airtricity, Northern Ireland's second-biggest electricity supplier, which raised its electricity tariffs by 9% from December 1. This means the typical customer saw their bill rise by around £62 per year.
It had already increased prices by 9.7% from August 2021, adding approximately £58 a year.
Budget Energy put prices up by 29% from November, the company's fourth price rise last year and affecting around 90,000 customers.
In October, Click Energy raised the prices for its customers by 16%, in what was the second price rise in a month.
It had previously raised tariffs by 9%.
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