SSE Airtricity customers face 9% rise in their bills from July

Customers with at SSE Airtricity will see the cost of heating and lighting their homes climb by almost €150 over the next 12 months after the company rolled out average price increases of just under 9 per cent.

Blaming climbing fuel prices on global energy markets, the company said the price increases will apply from July 14th.

The typical household dual fuel gas and electricity bill will increase by 8.9 per cent on average which will add €2.70 to the weekly cost for homeowners.

For single fuel customers, the standard price of electricity will increase by 6.4 per cent or €1.13 per week while the standard price of gas will rise by 12.3 per cent or €1.57 per week.

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The company said this was the first gas price increase since 2013 and the second in electricity prices over the same period.

“It follows a period of successive price cuts from 2015 during which SSE Airtricity reduced its standard gas and electricity prices for customers by 9 per cent,” it said in a statement.

The company blamed “continued volatility in wholesale energy markets” which, it said, has “seen sustained increases in fuel costs outside the direct control of SSE Airtricity, with the price of gas rising by over 20 per cent in the last 12 months.”

"The decision to increase energy prices is never taken lightly," the company's director of home energy David Manning added.

“It is in direct response to rising global energy costs outside of our control, and especially the sustained increases in wholesale gas prices over the past 12 months.”

He said the company had “done everything in our power” to protect customers from wholesale market volatility.

“We’ve kept our gas prices as low as possible, particularly during the recent harsh winter and we’ve worked hard to reduce our own internal costs at the same time.

However, we continue to experience sustained increases in wholesale costs and regrettably these eventually have to be reflected in our prices.”

It is likely other providers will follow suit and introduce price hikes.