Cheaper bills for elderly

Everyone aged 75 or over will be able to reduce their electricity/gas and telephone bills from the beginning of next month if they are the registered consumer of the service in their household.

About 10,000 people can apply for an allowance towards these services under the new scheme announced in the Budget which is aimed at improving supports for older people in society. Up to now, people over 75 only qualified for these allowances if they were receiving a social welfare payment or satisfied a means test.

But the free schemes are now being extended to all persons aged 75 or over. Anyone in this category who is permanently resident in the State is entitled to receive the allowances irrespective of who lives with them - as long as no other member of the household is already in receipt of the allowances. Theirs must be the name on the utility bill.

According to the Department of Social, Community and Family Affairs, formerly the Department of Social Welfare, the value to a person who is in receipt of all three schemes is about £412 per annum or around £8 per week. Only one of each type of allowance can be granted to any one household.

What is available?

The free electricity allowance, set out as Allowance 1 in the application form, will give qualifying people a certain amount of free electricity in each two-month billing period. This allowance covers normal standing charges and up to 1,500 units of electricity each year. So, on average, someone who gets the allowance will get 250 free units of electricity per two-month period.

The allowance will be worth approximately £154 over a 12-month period, reducing each ESB bill by around £26.

Where a recipient has either a slot meter or lives in accommodation where the registered consumer of electricity is the landlord, he/she can get the Free Electricity (Group Account) Allowance. Recipients of this allowance will get a book of 12 payable orders, each worth £12.30. The orders can be cashed each month at the recipient's local Post Office and used to pay electricity costs.

The free gas allowance is an alternative to the free electricity allowance for people whose homes are connected to natural gas or use gas cylinders. This will cover their normal standing/supply charges and a certain amount of free gas/kilowatt hours per year.

At the standard gas rate the allowance would be worth about £135 per year - it would reduce a recipient's three winter gas bills by £27 each and the three summer bills by £18 each. The gas allowance is expected to be applied to the recipient's gas bill from the first full billing period after September 30th or their 75th birthday if this falls after September 30th.

For people who use bottled gas, the allowance will be given through a book of 14 vouchers each year, with each voucher exchangeable for a cylinder of gas.

The free television allowance is set out as Allowance 2 in the application form. It comes into effect from September 30th and people who qualify will get a free TV licence - colour or black and white - from the next renewal date of their current licence. Recipients will have to claim their free licence - a colour licence costs £70 - from their local Post Office.

The telephone allowance, Allowance 3 in the application form, covers the normal two-monthly rental charge for a telephone and £1.90 worth of free calls in each two-month billing period. The VAT on all the charges covered by the allowance is included in the allowance. According to the Department the allowance will be worth £188.28 per annum to recipients. You must have a telephone installed to avail of the allowance which applies from October 1st or the applicant's 75th birthday.

How do you apply? An official two-page application form must be completed. One form covers all the allowances and applicants must indicate which of the allowances they are applying for. People can apply for all three allowances.

Where do you get application form? At any of the 100 plus local social welfare offices, or by telephoning the Department in Sligo at 071-48374 or in Dublin at 01-8748444 extension 8374.

How to complete the form: The first question asks applicants to indicate the allowances they are applying for.

Under the Allowance 1, applicants must decide whether they want the electricity or gas allowances and then whether they qualify for the individual or the group account electricity allowance or the natural or bottled gas allowance. Only one box should be ticked in this section. Then you are asked for some personal details: marital status, name, address, how long you have lived at that address, telephone number and your date of birth. The Department said it looked for telephone numbers so that it could contact an applicant if there was a problem setting up an allowance or if additional information was required.

Question 5 asks for your "PPS number". This is your Personal Public Service number which is a new title for the old Revenue and Social Insurance number. This number will be at the top of every communication you ever had with the Revenue Commissioners or with the social welfare offices.

Question 7 asks whether you are living alone. If the answer is no, you will have to provide a considerable amount of detail of those living with you who are aged 16 years and over - their names, relationships to you, dates of birth, sources of income or social welfare payments and their PPS/RSI, pension or other identifying numbers.

The Department said it needs this detail to establish if any/all of the allowances are already in payment to anyone in the household. What if other members of the household are unwilling to furnish the detail? The Department said the applicant can just fill in what they can and it will try to establish the details. But it could delay the processing of the form.

Question 8 asks if you have a free travel pass. If you have, you must fill in the pass number on the application form. If you do not have a pass, you must send in your birth certificate with the application - this will be returned when the form is processed. The birth certificate is required to verify the age of the applicant.

Under "Other Details" you are first asked if your home is connected to an electricity or natural gas supply. Whichever of these allowances you are applying for, you will have to provide a copy of a recent bill from that utility. The Department has pointed out that including a copy of the bill is important because it cannot proceed to process your application without it. While it may be difficult for some older people to get their bills copied, the Department said it needed these bills to set up the account information of the allowance recipient on its computer system.

An alternative would be to send in a recent original bill. A Department spokesman said that some of the people who have applied so far have sent in original bills - these will not be returned unless the applicant requests their return, but they are acceptable.

And it is important to note that the allowance will only be granted where the household account with the utility company is in the name of the applicant.

The same rules apply for the telephone allowance - a copy of a recent bill must be included and the allowance will only be paid where the account is in the name of the applicant.

Where do you send the form? There is a freepost envelope with the application forms preaddressed to the Free Schemes section of the Pensions Services Office at the Department of Social, Community and Family Affairs in Sligo.

Is there a closing date for applications? No. The scheme is open-ended with the allowances coming into effect from October 1st.

What do you need to send in with the form? A copy of a recent electricity or gas and a telephone bill and your birth certificate if you do not have a free travel pass.

What happens next? When the Department receives the application it will be processed - this could be slow as many applications are now coming in at around the same time. Once the claim is decided, successful applicants will get a letter from the Department informing them they have been awarded the allowances.

How do they work? At the same time as it writes to the recipient, the Department will inform the utilities involved - the ESB, Bord Gais and Eircom - that the recipient has been awarded the allowances.

The utility will then set up the customer's account to take in the payment from the Department. Recipients who qualify immediately and whose billing period starts on October 1st should see reductions in their October/November utility bill.

Where a recipient billing period starts during October, the allowances will not start to kick in until their next full billing period.