On disability benefits? You could save £100s on water bills from 2027 as WaterSure discount scheme to be expanded

If you're in Scotland, water bills work slightly differently as charges are part of your council tax bill, while there are no domestic water charges in Northern Ireland.

How the WaterSure scheme currently works

The scheme offers eligible households a cap on water bills – so that regardless of how much water you use, you don't pay more than your supplier's average household cost.

In 2024/25, some 260,000 eligible households saved an average of £325 each thanks to the scheme – equivalent to a third off their annual bill, according to the Government.

Currently, you need to meet the following conditions to qualify:

1) Have, or be waiting to get, a water meter. If you cannot have a water meter installed, you must be paying an assessed charge instead – this will be decided by your water supplier, and is based on how much water you typically use.

AND:

2) Be getting an eligible benefit. These are: Child Tax Credit, Housing Benefit, Income Support, Income-based Employment and Support Allowance, Income-based Jobseeker’s Allowance, Pension Credit, Universal Credit, Working Tax Credit.

AND EITHER:

3a) Have three or more children under the age of 19 and in full-time education living at home.

OR:

3b) Have a specific medical condition. This includes: Crohn's disease, desquamation (flaky skin disease), incontinence, renal failure (where you require home dialysis, unless the NHS is already contributing to your water bills), ulcerative colitis and weeping skin diseases.

You apply through your water supplier. You'll need to provide evidence of your benefits and medical condition as part of the process – what's accepted can vary by firm, so it's best to contact the firm directly to check.

What's changing from 2027

From the first half of next year, there will be four key changes to the WaterSure scheme in England (in Wales, these changes will be voluntary, so you'll need to check if your water supplier is taking part):

1. Three more benefits will qualify – though you'll still need to meet the other criteria listed above. The benefits being added are:
   - Attendance Allowance,
   - Disability Allowance, and
   - Personal Independence Payment (PIP).
   This change will allow 53,000 more households to qualify.

2. The way the cap is calculated will be reformed. Currently, some suppliers use the average of all the water bills they distribute, while others only use metered readings to calculate the average. The new plans will "ensure companies use the lowest possible average bill" as the cap – as a result, around 130,000 households will save an additional £26 on average, the Government said.

3. If you live alone, bills will be capped at the average amount of water ONE person uses. The current system doesn't account for the size of each household, so those living alone end up paying more than they should. Changing this will see 53,000 single-person households save an additional £100 each year.

4. You'll no longer need to provide a medical certificate to prove you have a qualifying medical condition. Instead, alternative proof such as a prescription or NHS letter will be enough.

Other recent measures designed to help with water bills

A range of measures designed to help households with their water bills – such as plans to launch a Water Ombudsman, introduce a single water regulator, improve guidance around social tariffs, and more – were announced by the Government in January, as part of its new 'Water White Paper' for England.

However, the White Paper didn't include a plans for a national social water tariff, which MoneySavingExpert.com founder Martin Lewis has long called for. When the paper was first published, he commented on the proposals, saying the lack of a universal social tariff was a "mistake". He suggested a halfway house compromise instead, which would bring in a "national minimum standard for social tariffs across the country, to add some consistency and basic expectations".

In addition, new water compensation rules took force in England in October 2025, with payouts for outages more than doubling in some cases. From July, if you experience with your water supply such as low pressure, outages or poor service, companies in England will be required to automatically pay compensation – previously, this was entirely voluntary.