Ways you could save on your energy bills

Finding ways to reduce your energy bills, can make a difference to your wallet. We’ll share tips for:
The Australian Government’s Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water suggests these options to keep your home cool, whilst saving money:
Select Reduce Energy Bills to learn more.
Consider these handy hints* to save you energy and money in the warmer months.
Warming your home in the colder months of the year, may also use a lot of energy. To reduce your energy costs, consider:
Consider these top tips to save you energy and money during the colder seasons.
First take time to better understand your energy bills. To help, consider this guidance on how to read your energy bill.
Then consider whether you could save money by making changes such as:
Spreading the cost out, to make paying large energy bills easier to manage. Some energy companies offer an instalment payment plan or ‘bill smoothing’, so you can make payments monthly, fortnightly or weekly, instead of having to pay the whole amount in one go or in sizeable quarterly bills. Contact your energy provider to ask about setting up instalment payment plans or bill smoothing.
Get organised and ready to make changes to your energy usage:
And if you’re having a short-term financial difficulty, try speaking to your energy supplier. According to the Australian Energy Regulator (AER) retailers must provide additional help to customers that are having trouble paying their energy bills due to hardship. Guidance so you know what to do, can understand your rights and hardship information in other languages is available on the AER’s site.
If you haven't reviewed your energy plan recently, it may be worth taking 10 to 15 minutes of your time to reviewing what you pay today against alternative energy offers available using free and independent government energy price comparison tools and websites.
Select Switch to Save or Energy Made Easy to learn more about comparison shopping.
Each Australian state and territory offer its eligible residents help to manage the cost of living, including energy bills.
Select Smart Savings to search for concessions and rebates for eligible Queenslanders. Notable savings for those eligible pensioners and concession care holders include the Electricity Rebate and the Reticulated Natural Gas Rebate.
Select SA Government’s Concessions to learn more about the programs available for eligible South Australians on low or fixed incomes. Programs include ConnectEd a state government funded program that provides information and individual case management to help residents manage their energy, water and telecommunications use and bills.
All rebates in the NT apply only to pensioners and concession card holders. An electricity concession of up to $1,200 per household per financial year is available to members of the NT concession scheme. Select Electricity Concessions NT to learn more.
The Tasmanian Government offers a range of discounts and concessions which aim to achieve a balance in the standard of living and access to essential services for all Tasmanians. Select Tasmanian Government: Discounts & Concessions to learn more. The Tasmanian government’s annual electricity concession provides a daily discount to eligible residents at a cents-per-day rate. Holders of a pensioner concession card, a low-income healthcare card, an ImmiCard on bridging visa E or a Tasmanian concession card are eligible for the discount on their primary place of residence.
A range of concessions are available to all Victorians who are on low incomes or experiencing hardship and need help to meet the rising cost of living. The Victorian Government publishes a Concessions & Benefits site with further particulars of the benefits available. The benefits include, the $250 Power Saving bonus a one-off payment for Victorian households to help ease cost-of-living pressures and encourage them to compare energy offers and save money.
In WA, the Household Energy Efficiency Scheme (HEES) program will assist 10,000 households experiencing hardship to be more energy efficient, which will not only reduce energy costs, but also energy emissions.
In NSW low-income households and people currently receiving Centrelink payments or benefits, may be eligible to access cost of living subsidies. Visit the NSW Government’s Concessions and rebate site to find out more. Visit Service NSW to learn more about the eligibility requirements.
This information is general in nature and has been prepared without taking your objectives, needs and overall financial situation into account. For this reason, you should consider the appropriateness for the information to your own circumstances and, if necessary, seek appropriate professional advice.
© Westpac Banking Corporation ABN 33 007 457 141 AFSL and Australian Credit Licence 233714.