Emergency and friendly hours credit

If you cannot afford to top up your prepayment meter, check if you can get emergency credit from your energy supplier. 

Emergency credit

It's a small amount of money to help you get gas or electricity. 

You'll need to pay it back next time you top up. 

How to get emergency credit

Emergency credit might be available on your meter automatically, or you might have to ask your supplier for it.

Contact your supplier to find out how:

• to get emergency credit
• much emergency credit you can get

Check how to find your energy supplier on the Citizens Advice Scotland website.

Extra emergency credit

You could get extra emergency credit if you're on the Priority Services Register.

The Priority Services Register is a free service that gives eligible people extra support.

There is a Priority Services Register for both your:

• energy supplier
• network operator

You can ask to be added to both. 

How to get extra emergency credit

Contact your energy supplier to: 

• find out if you're eligible for the Register
• ask to be added to it
• find out what support you can get

You can be added to your network operator's Register by:

• asking your energy supplier to pass on your details to your network operator
• using the Priority Services Register Scotland website

You can find out more about the Priority Services Register on the Citizens Advice Scotland website.

Friendly hours credit

This lets you keep using electricity and gas when you’ve run out of credit on your prepayment meter. It's sometimes called friendly credit.

How to get friendly hours credit

You can usually get it on:

• evenings
• weekends
• Bank Holidays

When you can access it depends on:

• your supplier
• the type of prepayment meter you have

You'll need to pay back what you use during this time the next time you top up.