What is emergency credit?

When your meter is running low on credit, you are able to access emergency credit all year round.

Smart Prepayment

£10 emergency credit is available on both your smart gas and / or electricity meter.

If you have a smart prepayment meter, you can activate emergency credit on your In-Home Display (the little screen which shows you information about your meter).

Want to know how to check if your smart prepayment meter is using emergency credit? We've explained how to check that here.

If you’re already off supply

If the meter screen is off, press either button once to wake it up. The screen will show a message about activating emergency credit.

Press either button once to activate emergency credit.

Important: If your supply is already off, make sure any electrical appliances are switched off before reconnecting your electricity supply.

Traditional prepayment

£10 emergency credit is available on a non-smart electricity meter.

£20 emergency credit is available on a non-smart gas meter.

If you have a non-smart prepayment meter, once you are down to the last £1 of your electricity credit, or £2 of your gas credit, you just need to insert your electricity key or gas card to activate the emergency credit.

Please be aware that any emergency credit you use will be taken off your balance the next time you top up.

Running out of emergency credit

If your emergency credit runs out and you can’t afford to top up then please contact us as soon as possible so we can help.

You can email us via emergencies@octopus.energy, or call us on 0808 164 1088. Our phone lines are open 9am - 5pm Monday to Thursday, and 9am - 4pm on a Friday.

We may be able to provide you with additional support to get back on supply. You will need to pay back any borrowed credit, but we can spread the cost so you’re only ever paying what you can afford.