As the director of the Municipal Social Welfare Centre in Wrocław says, the office he manages has 60 days to consider a correctly submitted application for an energy voucher. – The granting of an energy voucher will depend on the income threshold per person in the family, and the amount of this benefit will depend on the number of people in the household – reminds Andrzej Mańkowski in an interview with “Republic”.
Energy voucher. Offices and municipalities are waiting for money from the budget
The first applications for the energy voucher are already arriving at the offices. In Łódź, almost 700 of them were submitted in paper form, in Gdańsk there were almost 800 and about 2/3 of them were submitted by InternetBydgoszcz almost 455, and in Lublin 450. Officials admit that the interest in granting the energy voucher is high. Łódź officials emphasize that “the time for paying out the support is until the end of 2024, but so far the funds for this purpose have not been received from the ministry” – reports “Rz”. Similar voices come from Lublin and Gdańsk. – The voucher will be paid out after receiving funds from the state budget. This will probably happen in the fourth quarter of this year – says Marcin Szeląg from the Gdańsk city hall.
Who is eligible for an energy voucher? Here are the rules
The energy voucher is a one-time cash benefit for people with lower incomes and government support for electricity consumers. It was introduced by law after the July the inflation shield was no longer in effect and it was known that electricity bills would go up. Around 3.5 million households could benefit from government support. In May, the government set the maximum price of electricity at PLN 500/MWh, and people with lower incomes would be able to take advantage of an energy voucher. Support is available to every household if the income threshold does not exceed: PLN 2,500 for single-person households and PLN 1,700 per person for multi-person households. An application for an energy voucher can be submitted to Application mObywatel, on the gov.pl website, on the epuap.gov.pl website, in person at the commune office in your place of residence.
Energy voucher amount
The amount of the energy voucher will depend on the number of people in the household. It is planned 300 PLN for single-person households, PLN 400 for two- and three-person households, PLN 500 for four- and five-person households, and PLN 600 for six-person households and larger. If a given household uses heating sources powered by electricity, the value of the energy voucher will increase by 100 percent. Depending on the size of the household, it will be from PLN 600 to PLN 1,200. When paying out the energy voucher, the so-called “zloty for zloty” rule will apply. Therefore, if the income criterion is exceeded, it is still possible to apply for an energy voucher. In such a case, the amount of the benefit will be reduced by the amount of this excess. The minimum amount of energy vouchers paid out will be PLN 20.