They say the emissions trading scheme (ETS) and the increase in GST will only worsen the sometimes-annual electricity price rises some are already hard-pressed to afford.
Fifty-nine applications were made to the Dunedin City Council's consumer electricity fund last month - 13 more than in June last year.
Anglican Family Care child and family support service manager Kathy Richards, whose organisation administers the fund, expected application rates to increase as price rises and winter energy consumption started to bite.
"It is definitely tracking up, and that's even before the impact of the emissions trading scheme increases and the new GST rate have an effect," she said.
"We've seen some families in really dire straits in the past, and I'm worried that things certainly haven't become any easier."
In previous months, it was not unusual for workers at the six agencies distributing the fund to work with families that had $1500 to $2000 power bills by August or September.
Those bills were amassed over several months by families that were sometimes already $150 to $200 shy of what they needed to pay all their weekly bills, she said.
And those weekly bills looked set to balloon as businesses everywhere passed on the cost of the emissions trading scheme and the new 15% GST rate.
"If a family applies to the fund, then the power bill is usually just one of a number of bills they are struggling with. And these new costs might only make that worse."
The fund of about $200,000 provides a one-off payment of $200 towards electricity bills. People who are working with a budgeting service for more than six weeks can get up to $350.
There were 781 applications to the fund in in the year to June, about the same as the year before. Those numbers represented the upper limit of what was available in the fund, whose council grant had to be managed across an entire financial year.
Anglican Family Care was contracted to help 90 people with budgeting advice last year. Demand was such it helped 164.
Dunedin Budget Advisory Service co-ordinator Shirley Woodrow said there had been no noticeable increase in inquiries so far this winter but there was no doubt many people on fixed incomes would be hurt by the new energy bills.
Reports some businesses planned to make their ETS-related increases when GST rises in October would be a price shock for people who could not afford it. It all meant spring might be busier for budget workers, she said.
Mercury Energy and Contact have added more than 3% to the average power bill to cover their ETS costs. Other companies have adopted a wait-and-see approach. Contact's ETS rise was accompanied by a baseline tariff rise that would add another 6% to the average electricity bill.
The double-whammy had prompted the Government to warn companies not to use the ETS to unreasonably hike prices.
POWER BROKERS
Agencies that can help people access Dunedin's electricity fund
• Anglican Family Care
• Catholic Social Services
• Corpac Trust
• Dunedin Budget Advisory Service
• Family Works - Presbyterian Support Otago
• Salvation Army
