Energy costs: VKU: December help largely handled without problems

From the point of view of municipal utilities and municipal energy suppliers, the December emergency aid for gas and district heating customers went largely smoothly. Despite the great effort and time pressure, the energy suppliers managed to pass on the relief to consumers on time, said a spokesman for the Association of Municipal Companies (VKU) on Friday, according to the announcement. He was referring to a random survey among the more than 1,500 member companies.

Gas and district heating customers did not have to pay a deduction in December. The federal government bears the costs. The measure was intended to relieve the burden on private households and small and medium-sized companies in particular. Around 20 million households benefited from the aid. For tenants, the relief usually only arrives with the next utility bill.

Many customer inquiries to the energy suppliers

According to the VKU, the forecast annual consumption and the amount of the relief aid led to many customer inquiries from the energy suppliers. “Individual problems could not be completely ruled out with millions of payment transactions,” the statement said. Among other things, some customers had mistakenly transferred their advance payment in full by bank transfer. An energy supplier reported to the VKU that due to a system error, the advance payment for natural gas had not been completely suppressed, but had been postponed to January. “The amounts received or collected in error were refunded to the consumers or credited to the customer account,” said the VKU.

Consumers’ need for information continues to be “extremely large”. “The focus of the questions is now the start of the gas and heat price brake as well as the electricity price brake. This effort represents a very significant burden for the companies.”