Workers can't pay power bills

[Banker]

PEOPLE who work, and not pensioners, the unemployed and students, are the new group who face having their electricity disconnected in NSW.

Both the NSW Energy and Water Ombudsman and the Public Interest Advocacy Centre report that working people are increasingly facing disconnection, and it is a trend that would get worse.

The Energy and Water Ombudsman, Clare Petre, said consumer anxiety was high.

''This is a group of people who work but are on low incomes and are so financially stretched that they have no financial flexibility to deal with any increases,'' she said.

Although the profile of people who have utilities disconnected is changing, the rate of gas and electricity disconnection in NSW is decreasing.

Figures from the Independent Pricing and Regulatory Tribunal (IPART) show that in the 2009-10 financial year, 30,646 people in the state had their gas and electricity disconnected, compared with 37,594 in 2007-08. About 8 per cent of residential customers who were disconnected in 2009-10 were disconnected more than once.

But in the past six months, the Ombudsman has seen a 5 per cent increase in the number of people who have called and said they were facing disconnection, compared with the same period last year.

Carolyn Hodge, the senior policy officer at the Public Interest Advocacy Centre, said she expected an increase in disconnections in the current financial year because of ''price pressures''.

She said working people were vulnerable to disconnection because they were less likely to qualify for low-income rebates.

The Energy Minister, Chris Hartcher, said that the government provided Energy Accounts Payment Assistance vouchers to people who needed emergency assistance to pay their bills, and he would make sure fewer people were forcibly disconnected from utilities in future.

''We are doing everything we can to reduce the impact of power price rises and prevent massive increases in the future, including reducing instances of disconnected utilities,'' he said.

IPART predicted residential customers would pay between $4 and $6 a week more for electricity from July 1.

Energy companies must contact a customer at least twice before disconnection and propose a suitable payment plan.

www.smh.com.au/nsw/workers-cant-pay-power-bills-20110730-1i5e7.html

[spaceyone]

She said working people were vulnerable to disconnection because they were less likely to qualify for low-income rebates.


Pensioner concessions used to be good, $20 or so off your $230 power bill. But when deducted from a $500 bill, not much help.

I guess they also refer to the fact that we can go to the Salvation Army or Lifeline to get a voucher to get another $20 or so off it, whereas someone who works cannot.

The other reason welfare recipients must be avoiding disconnection, is the power companies willingness to take money straight from your Centrelink payment each fortnight to credit to your next bill.

I enquired about this once with a power company, when they wanted to charge me a large deposit. The only way around the deposit was to agree to automatic deductions from my Centrelink pay. They calculated over the phone how much they would take, worked out from my last winter sized bill it seemed, and wanted to take $75 a fortnight off me.

I paid the deposit, rather than to end up in credit with the power company, to a rather large degree. This was about 3 years ago, when power bills were still only about $300-$350.

How many welfare recipients are living on nothing, after having their rent and power costs deducted from their payment, just to ensure that they can keep those two things?

[Banjo]

You will always get people who struggle on what seems like quite a substantial income, there was an article in The Age last year about a couple/family jointly earning $150K pa and their financial problems, while others manage to get by on their pensions.