Electric Ireland announces price change from August 1

How is the price increase broken down in customer bills? 

• Customers will see their average electricity bill increase by 10.9% including PSO and VAT.  

• Customers will see their Electricity unit rate increase by 11.35% or €10.22 per month/€122.64 per year. 

• Customers will see their electricity standing charge increase by 11.35% or €2.36 per month/€28.32 per year.  

• Customers will see their average gas bill increase by 29.2% including Carbon Tax and VAT.  

• Customers will see their gas unit rate increase by 31.9% or €20.30 per month/€243.54 per year.  

• Customers will see their gas standing charge increase by 31.9% or €3.52 per month/€42.28 per year.  

Customer Support 

At Electric Ireland we are aware that some of our customers may experience financial difficulties and uncertainty, and we have put in place a range of initiatives to support customers in such circumstances.  

• Included is a new €3 million Electric Ireland Hardship Fund opening this autumn to help customers who have difficulty paying their bills. The fund will operate throughout the winter months and into next year to ensure customers who need assistance in paying bills are supported. Access and administration criteria for the new fund will be announced over the summer. 

• This brings to €6 million the amount Electric Ireland has committed since winter 2020, to provide additional support to those of our customers who are experiencing difficulty in paying bills, not including bad debts. 

• In December 2020 Electric Ireland administered €1 million to support 10,000 registered vulnerable customers via a Christmas credit 

• In March 2021, a €2 Million Hardship Fund was announced to support customers who were having difficulty in paying bills initially as a result of the Covid pandemic and then as a result of increasing energy costs. The funds were administered by our partners SVP and MABS in the form of energy credits. 

• As a matter of course, Electric Ireland engages with all residential customers who experience difficulty paying their bills in line with the voluntary Industry Energy Engage Code and we encourage any Electric Ireland customer who has difficulty in paying their energy bill to contact  us and we will work with them to put in place a manageable payment plan.  We have many thousands of these payment plans in place at present. 

• Electric Ireland works with Fuel Poor customers who sign up to the Household Budget Scheme, or Industry Solution Prepayment Meter as a way to pay their energy bills and also apply a 5% discount.  

• We also provide several flexible payment options to help customers, including an Equaliser product that enables customers to spread their energy costs in equal payments across the year or to take a payment holiday by agreeing a plan to pay their bills over 11 months instead of 12. 

• At Electric Ireland, we are committed to providing the best value to our customers and currently offer the lowest standard unit rate in the market for electricity bills, with an available additional enduring discount rate of up to 8.5% for direct debit and e-billing customers, which reduces those unit rates further.

  Customers who are experiencing financial difficulty or having trouble paying their energy bills are asked to please call our team on 1800 372 372 or email.