NHF: Six in 10 Londoners shiver at home in fear of winter bills

Tuesday, 26 January 2010 12:00 AM

Touching that thermostat may infuriate partners but a new poll has shown that six in 10 Londoners are living in colder homes than they would like this winter in a desperate bid to cut sky-high fuel bills.

The YouGov survey, commissioned by the National Housing Federation, also found that 21% of Londoners are living in fuel poverty - where customers pay more than 10% of their monthly income on gas and electricity bills.

Belinda Porich, head of the Federation's London region, said: "Heating has become a luxury for many in London, particularly the elderly, low paid and unemployed. Not so long ago a luxury was a weekend away. Now it's heating your home for a couple of hours."

The poll also found widespread support for the idea that London's prepay meter customers - amongst those hardest hit by the economic downturn - should not have to pay for supplying and maintaining their meters. Almost seven in 10 Londoners (69%) who pay for the cost of their own heating agreed with this idea.

British Gas has heaped further misery on its prepay customers by charging them a premium of up to £40 a year more for gas than those paying their bills quarterly. British Gas' competitors have all scrapped their unpopular prepay surcharges following criticism over rip off prices.

Porich said: "British Gas should come out of the cold and stop discriminating against some of its poorest customers. It should scrap its hugely unpopular prepay premium and start charging them the same as its quarterly billed customers. Energy suppliers have a legitimate right to fit meters to recover debts, but to then penalise hard up people by forcing them to pay higher prices for their energy is an outrage."

Almost one in two Londoners (47%) thought the energy regulator Ofgem had done a poor or very poor job of protecting vulnerable customers.

NOTES

For more information or to request an interview with Belinda Porich, please contact London press officer Brian Church on 07979 592823 / brianc@housing.org.uk.

All figures, unless otherwise stated, are from YouGov Plc. Total sample size was 2,050 adults. Fieldwork was undertaken between 8-10 December 2009. The survey was carried out online. Figures have been weighted and are representative of all GB adults (aged 18+).

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