Insights from the 2026 Energy Affordability Tracker

The 2022/23 energy crisis increased bills markedly for consumers. Even with government support in the form of rebates and price ceilings, many consumers built up significant debt and arrears on their energy bills. The total accumulated debt and arrears among domestic households in GB is now approximately £4.5bn according to Ofgem. All households continue to bear the cost of this as the costs are socialised across energy bills.

While bills have fallen significantly since their peak, many consumers are still struggling to meet their energy needs. In 2024, an estimated 28.7% of Scottish households – around 732,000 households – were in fuel poverty, including 14% (around 357,000 households) in extreme fuel poverty.[8]

Some changes have already been made by the UK Government to move policy costs off energy bills and on to general taxation. Specifically, domestic energy bills are £150 lower than would otherwise have been the case as a result of the decisions to take 75% of the domestic costs of the Renewables Obligation into taxation and the Energy Company Obligation no longer being levied on energy bills.[9] These changes came into effect in April of this year.

As well as tracking trends in affordability and debt, the current wave of our survey also covered questions on consumers’ understanding of their energy bills, and the role of standing charges. These more general issues will be considered in a separate, forthcoming report.

Financial context

Households have reduced their use of energy over the last decade,[10] even as the amount they spend on energy, both in real terms and as a share of total household expenditure, has increased.

Domestic energy consumption fell sharply during the 2022 energy price crisis, declining by 16% in 2022 and a further 4.8% in 2023. The previous long-term trend had been one of gradual reduction. Consumption then increased in 2024 by 3.8%, likely due to slightly cooler temperatures and some easing of the high energy and other prices that depressed consumption levels in 2023.[11]

Over the same period, household expenditure on electricity and gas as a share of total consumer spending changed. It increased from 2.5% in 2021-2022 to 3.5% in 2022-2023, then eased slightly to 2.9% in 2023-2024. It returned to pre-crisis levels, at 2.4%, in 2024-2025.[12]

Increased consumer expenditure on domestic energy has coincided with a substantial increase in energy debt and arrears, from £1.09bn in Q1 2018 to £4.55bn in Q4 2025, representing a four-fold increase.[13] This increase has been primarily driven by arrears, which have increased by more than sixfold and now makes up the majority (£3.44bn) of the total amount (Chart 2).

Work is ongoing to mitigate some of these significant debt and arrears challenges, including through Ofgem’s proposed Debt Relief Scheme for those in most acute need[14] and through updates to the regulator’s Debt Strategy[15] which Consumer Scotland has been engaging in.

Other measures which could bring down the costs of energy for consumers, such as financial incentives for demand flexibility, are at a relatively early stage of uptake. We will seek to track the impact of these policies on consumers in Scotland as they develop.

The Bank of England has estimated that there will be a direct and indirect impact on households arising from the conflict in the Middle East. They anticipate a percentage increase of 0.9 to CPI inflation by 2026 Q3 directly from higher energy prices for households compared to its previous estimates, and a further percentage increase of 0.3 indirectly due to companies passing on their higher energy costs, such as from food production. The Bank also warns that these expected increases in food prices will have a greater impact on low-income households.[16]

Rising levels of energy debt are largely driven by sustained high prices. This underlines the need for more effective and better targeted affordability support. We welcome the UK Government investigating options for additional targeted bill support for winter 2026-2027, should the conflict in the Middle East cause significant energy price increases. In the medium to long term, existing schemes, including the Warm Home Discount, are insufficiently targeted to households facing the greatest affordability pressures. We are developing proposals to present to the UK and Scottish governments setting out how better, more effective targeting could be achieved through improved use of UK-wide and Scottish public sector datasets and delivery mechanisms.

The Energy Affordability Tracker

Consumer Scotland has been tracking consumers’ perceptions of the affordability of energy bills regularly since March 2022, when consumers faced rapidly increasing energy prices. The survey allows us to understand consumers in Scotland’s experiences of energy affordability and debt, and how they have changed over time.

It also provides insight into a broad range of consumer issues in the energy market. For example, our latest survey introduced questions covering consumers’ knowledge of standing charges which we will report on separately.

This report describes the findings from the eighth wave (winter 2025-2026) of the energy tracker survey, the fieldwork for which took place between 27 January and 17 February 2026. The survey was initially administered more frequently, but from winter 2023-2024, the survey has been carried out annually as energy prices stabilised. This report contextualises the latest findings and compares them with previous waves of the survey (Table 1).

The Energy Affordability Tracker is administered as an online survey, and the most recent wave was delivered on our behalf by IFF Research. Adults aged 16 and over in Scotland are invited to participate in the survey until the survey quota and stratification target is reached. The responding sample is weighted to the profile of the sample definition to provide a representative reporting sample. Approximately 1,600 individuals have been interviewed at each wave.

The survey sample for the eighth wave had a higher proportion of electricity consumers and lower proportion of mains gas households compared with published estimates. For example, 26% of survey respondents reported electricity as their main heating type, compared with around 10% estimated by the Scottish House Condition Survey (SHCS).[17] Conversely, 63% of respondents reported mains gas as their main heating type, compared with around 81% in the SHCS.

We undertook sensitivity analysis to ensure that these differences in sample structure did not affect the comparability or robustness of our main findings over time. These analyses included examining the sensitivity of results to re-weighting the sample to redress the imbalance; and examining the trends over time for the different sub-groups were parallel or divergent. These gave us confidence that our headline findings are robust to the sample structure. In addition, all regression analyses control for heating type. 

The prevalence of energy debt has increased over time across most consumers, but the rate of the increase varies considerably across different groups. With the caveat that sample sizes are relatively small for some sub‑groups, there is emerging evidence that younger consumers in particular have experienced a sharper rise in reported energy debt since 2023.

Among 16-24-year-olds, the proportion of consumers in Scotland reporting being in energy debt rose from 8% in October 2023 to 31% in January/February 2026 – almost a four-fold increase in just over two years (Chart 4). Over the same period, energy debt has also risen substantially among 45-54-year-olds, increasing from 8% to 24%. By contrast, the proportion of people aged 65 and over reporting being in energy debt rose from 3% to 6%, and older consumers consistently reported lower levels of energy debt.

Energy debt varies by household finances and composition

Certain groups of consumers were significantly more likely to report being in energy debt or arrears. As shown in Chart 5, energy debt was more prevalent among:

• Households who receive means-tested benefits (38%) compared with those who do not (13%)
• Households with children under five (34%) compared with those without (17%)
• Households with 5 or more members (33%), compared with single person (21%) or 2-4 people households (17%)
• Households where a member has a disability or health condition (31%), compared with those that do not (15%)
• Lower-income households, particularly those with incomes under £20,000 (29%), compared with higher-income households (11-19%)[25]
• Those who pay for their energy through a prepayment meter (28%), compared with those who pay by regular direct debit or standing order (17%)
• Households whose main heating type is electricity (27%) compared with mains gas (16%)
• Working-age households (under 65-year-olds, 21%), compared with those with over-65-year-olds (12%)

Many of the characteristics associated with energy debt are related to one another, making it difficult to determine which factors are most strongly associated with differences in energy debt based on this descriptive analysis alone. We therefore performed a logistic regression to estimate the probability of a household being in energy debt, allowing multiple household and demographic characteristics to be considered simultaneously and controlling for the effects of other variables.[26]

The results of the regression analysis are summarised in Chart 6; again, the characteristics most strongly associated with energy debt are those relating to financial situation and household composition. They indicate that:

• Households who receive means-tested benefits face the highest risk and are around 19 percentage points more likely to be in energy debt than those who receive no means-tested benefits
• Households with children under five are 11 percentage points more likely to be in energy debt than those without
• Working-age households (under 65-year-olds) are 10 percentage points more likely to be in energy debt than those with over-65-year-olds
• Households with 5 or more members are 10 percentage points more likely to be in energy debt than single person households
• Households where a member has a disability or health condition are around 9 percentage points more likely to be in energy debt, compared with those without
• Lower-income households (under £39,999) are more likely to be in energy debt, compared with those with an income of over £60,000, by 7-10 
• Households whose main heating type is electricity are 8 percentage points more likely to be in energy debt, compared with mains gas

Other characteristics – such as payment method – were statistically significant initially but no longer statistically significant once other factors were controlled for.[27]

While there have been significant interventions for older consumers in debt or facing affordability issues, including the Pension Age Winter Heating Payment, Warm Home Discount and Winter Heating Payment,[28] our evidence would suggest that wider and more accurately targeted interventions are needed that better support all consumers facing energy affordability issues. We have set out our views on how this could be achieved previously in our papers on energy affordability[29] and in response to consultations by Ofgem and DESNZ regarding energy market interventions such as the Debt Relief Scheme[30], Warm Home Discount[31] and forthcoming research on the use of data to better target affordability support across consumer markets.

Energy debt is typically new, with many households lacking formal repayment arrangements

Around a third (32%) of respondents have been in energy debt for under 3 months, with a further 38% for 4-12 months. A smaller proportion (14%) have been in energy debt for more than a year. Overall, this indicates that energy debt is relatively new for most people, with around 70% having been in energy debt for less than a year.

In terms of the types of energy debt that consumers have, almost half (45%) are behind on bills but have no formal debt repayment plan or debt recovery action. More than a third (37%) do have a formal repayment plan in place with their energy company (including through a prepayment meter).

Ofgem estimates the average debt level where there is no arrangement to repay the debt (arrears) to be £1,773 for electricity accounts and £1,512 for gas accounts in Q4 2025. For those with a repayment plan (debt), Ofgem estimates that the average debt remaining was £799 for electricity consumers and £651 for gas consumers.[32] This is specifically debt that is owed by consumers to suppliers – whereas our measure of debt is broader, encompassing resources that consumers have borrowed to pay their energy bills.

Encouragingly, two thirds (66%) of those in energy debt feel confident that they will be able to clear their debt. The majority (59%) of those with an energy debt repayment plan with their energy company find their repayments easy to keep up with.[33]

However, over a third of households (35%) in energy debt have experienced legal or debt recovery action due to their debt. Ofgem are in the consultation process for new consumer outcomes in the energy market.[34] It will be important for this work to reduce the number of consumers who experience legal and debt recovery action through better support and interventions being provided by suppliers at earlier stages of consumer need.

A significant proportion of consumers have been moved on to prepayment meters due to their energy debt

Over a third (36%) of households in energy debt reported that they have been put on a prepayment meter due to their debt. This is similar to last year (34%) but has more than doubled since 2023 and 2024, indicating a significant rise in the proportion of indebted households being moved to prepayment meters (Chart 7).

While this continues to affect a relatively small share of households overall, the number is growing – from 1% in 2023 to 7% this year – highlighting the growing use of prepayment meters after the involuntary prepayment meter moratorium started to lift towards the end of 2023, and as affordability and debt pressures persist.

Consistent with this trend, Ofgem data shows the proportion of customers repaying a debt to their supplier using a prepayment meter rose significantly and peaked in Q4 2023 and Q1 2024 at 58% for electricity and 56% for gas customers. In Q3 2025 this fell to 41% for electricity customers and 38% for gas customers, just above the historical average prior to the 2022 energy crisis.[35]

Around six in ten respondents in energy debt had contacted their energy supplier about their debt (62%), and a similar proportion (61%) report that their supplier had contacted them. One in five (19%) had neither contacted their supplier nor been contacted by them about their debt.

More work is needed to support the one in five consumers in energy debt who have had no contact with their supplier. Supplier engagement is key to prevent, manage and mitigate household debt and affordability issues. The importance of engagement was illustrated in Ofgem’s proposed Debt Relief Scheme, requiring a basic level of consumer engagement to ensure that the scheme was not simply a debt-write off, but a debt “reset” that aimed to encourage long-term debt management and engagement.[36]

Ofgem has previously issued guidance to suppliers setting out its expectations on how consumers should be able to easily contact them.[37] The regulator is in the process of consulting on an outcomes-based model to further improve the standard and quality of how consumers engage with their energy supplier.[38]

Certain consumers are more likely to experience energy affordability challenges

We performed a logistic regression to estimate the probability of a household finding it difficult to keep up with their energy bills. This model considers a range of household and demographic characteristics simultaneously, allowing us to identify which factors are independently associated with finding it difficult to keep up with their energy bills, after controlling for other variables.

Difficulty keeping up with energy bills is strongly associated with income and wider household circumstances (Chart 9). In particular, households in lower income bands are significantly more likely to report difficulty than those with incomes of £60,000 or more. Those with household incomes under £20,000 are estimated to be 15 percentage points more likely to find it difficult to keep up with energy bills, with smaller but still statistically significant increases observed for households earning £20,000-£39,999 (7 percentage points).

Beyond income, several indicators relating to financial vulnerability are also associated with a higher probability of difficulty paying energy bills: households who pay their bill when it arrives or have a prepayment meter; who receive means‑tested benefits; where a member has a disability or health condition; working‑age households (with no members aged 65 and over).

Overall, these associations are broadly consistent with those identified in our winter 2025 analysis and report. A more detailed discussion of the drivers of energy affordability and interpretation of these results is provided in Insights from the 2025 Energy Affordability Tracker.

Similar characteristics are also associated with a higher probability of households reporting that they cannot afford to heat their home to a comfortable level.

A third of consumers recently sought advice about paying their energy bills

A third (34%) of households reported that they had sought advice about paying their energy bills in the last 3 months (Chart 10). Similar to last year, this figure has doubled since winter 2023-2024 (18%). This increase is encouraging, as greater engagement allows energy suppliers to offer support such as repayment plans to help manage debt and prevent it from escalating. It may also allow consumers to access help for persistent debt through the proposed Debt Relief Scheme, which requires customers to contact their supplier about their debt to get support.

Of those who sought advice, the most reported source was friends or family (51%), followed by their energy company (36%) and local council (25%). Smaller numbers sought advice in person at their local advice centre, from an advice phone line, and from a money advice charity (all 14%). This suggests that consumers are more reliant on informal sources of advice such as friends and family, potentially limiting access to the necessary formal support schemes.

Four in ten consumers have received financial support to help pay for energy

The proportion of households receiving financial support to help with the cost of energy increased this year, with just under four in ten respondents (39%) having received at least one form of support. This is the highest level recorded since this question was first asked, in October 2023 (Chart 11).

Last year saw a notable dip, with around a quarter of respondents reporting receipt of any financial support. This decline likely reflects reduced eligibility and availability of some schemes, including restrictions to Winter Fuel Payment during winter 2024-2025. This policy change was subsequently reversed for winter 2025-26 which may be contributing to the increase observed this year, as the proportion of respondents receiving Winter Fuel Payment (now ‘Pension Age Winter Heating Assistance’) is now more closely aligned with levels seen in 2023 and early 2024.

The most common types of financial support were Pension Age Winter Heating Payment (previously Winter Fuel Payment), received by 16% of all respondents, and the Warm Home Discount, received by 11%.

Most consumers are satisfied with their energy supplier

Most (76%) consumers in Scotland are ‘very’ or ‘fairly’ satisfied with their energy supplier, slightly less than the satisfaction level (82%) found by Ofgem and Citizen Advice’s Energy Consumer Satisfaction Survey (ECSS).[42]

Satisfaction with energy supplier varied across providers (Chart 12). The vast majority of Octopus Energy and E.ON Next consumers were satisfied with their energy supplier (85% and 84%). Around a quarter of British Gas and Scottish Power consumers were satisfied (75% and 74%). Ovo Energy had the lowest rates of satisfaction, with 61% of consumers being satisfied, 24% being neither satisfied nor dissatisfied, and 13% being dissatisfied. These findings are broadly aligned with Citizens Advice energy supplier rankings, where Octopus Energy and E.ON Next appear within the top 5, while the rankings of the other suppliers are less consistent.[43]

69% of consumers said their supplier makes it easy to contact them if they need to, slightly more than what the ECSS found in Q1 2026 (66%).[44] Around four in ten (39%) of consumers have contacted their supplier in the last six months, particularly those in energy debt (67%) and those with children under five (54%). Most (72%) consumers who had contacted their supplier felt that their issue or query was dealt with well, but 15% felt that it was not.

Most consumers (68%) found the language used in their energy bill easy to understand, however 14% of consumers found it difficult. Additionally, 12% said the energy bills they receive do not provide guidance on what to do if they are worried about paying their bill.

One in five (22%) respondents reported that their energy supplier was the only one available to them. This represents an increase compared to previous waves and is the highest recorded to date (Chart 13). This figure increased steadily since January/February 2024, following a lower point in October 2023.