Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, if he will make it his policy to ban energy suppliers from forcibly switching households having difficulty paying energy bills onto energy prepayment meters.

Prepayment meters (PPMs) allow customers to pay for energy on a pay-as-you-go basis and serve an important function by helping the avoidance of debt and court action. A ban on PPM switching as a last resort could lead to an increase in bailiff action. There are no plans to remove this option.

Ofgem has stringent rules on the force-fitting of PPMs. My Rt. Hon. Friend the Secretary of State has written to Ofgem asking them to conduct a review to make sure suppliers are complying with those rules. The Secretary of State has also asked energy suppliers to commit voluntarily to stopping this practice.