Surface Water Drainage Concession Companies supplying water and drainage have agreed to offer community groups, which includes village halls, a concession when it comes to charging for surface water drainage. This has saved some members £100s. Surface Water Drainage is the charge made for the water flowing off buildings and hard surfaces like car parks. For village halls, and similar properties, the annual charge  will be capped at the lowest band.  To obtain this concession, if you are not already receiving it, you will need to apply by contacting the company  which invoices you. Please note that eligible properties must have a metered water supply and be connected to main drainage to obtain the surface water drainage concession. If your hall has its own septic tank then you won’t be paying any drainage charges.

Changes to Water Industry From April 2017 all businesses (that includes charities like halls) will have the opportunity to choose their retail service provider, just as you can with other utilities such as gas and electricity. This means that no matter how much or how little water your venue uses, you will be able to choose who provides your customer service activities such as billing, customer enquiries, payments and meter readings. Northumbrian Water (which are part of Northumbrian Water Group) will still be your wholesaler so will continue to supply your water from the same source and provide your sewerage services.

Some members have reported very significant increases in their water bills. They are all halls which do not have a metered supply. For non-domestic properties like community buildings, Northumbrian Water offer a free inspection to identify the cost of installing a meter. For many this initial cost might well be worth while. Go to this link for more information and contact details.

Reducing Energy Costs  The best way to avoid ever-rising energy bills is to reduce consumption by ensuring that the hall is well insulated and/or to install alternative sources of that energy – like solar panels, heat exchange systems etc. There are plenty of excellent examples of halls benefitting from this route. For those halls which want to make immediate savings there is another way. Over the last few years a number of schemes have emerged whereby groups of users have joined together to buy their electricity or heating oil in ”bulk”.

EnergyCAN In March 2022 CAN regretfully announced that it was discontinuing the EnergyCAN scheme.  The COVID lockdowns of 2020/21 badly affected the energy brokerage businesses and one of the results was that LSI Energy Ltd, the company that has handled our quotations and contracts since 2011, was taken over by Inspire Energy which in turn handed over their small and medium contracts business to a company called EnergiSave, including the portfolio of contracts that LSI Energy had handled for EnergyCAN. CAN entered into discussions with EnergiSave with view to continuing a similar arrangement with them. However, it has not been possible to conclude a deal with EnergiSave with the result that the CAN Board has decided to discontinue EnergyCAN.

EnergiSave is currently holding the contracts that were being handled by LSI Energy. When the contracts are coming up for renewal the contract holders may receive contact from EnergiSave with the offer to obtain quotations to find the best deal.

There are still 29 contracts negotiated under EnergyCAN which are still live with contract end dates in 2022, 2023 or 2024. LSI Energy will continue to pay commission for these contracts. The commission will continue to be received by CAN and distributed to the two Consortia. However, the Consortia need to be aware that some of the commission due to be received by LSI was negative due to the lack of energy used during the lockdown periods in 2020 and 2021. These negative amounts will be offset from what we hope will be positive amounts received during the remainder period of the contracts.

The village halls and similar organisations that had their energy contracts negotiated through EnergyCAN need to be aware of the position of their contracts. Where the contract end date is in 2022, 2023 or 2024 supply will continue under these contracts until the contract end date.

OilCAN There are many bulk buying schemes involving heating oil operating in the county.   CAN offers one and it is open to village halls. CAN is partnered with Affinity (part of a large farmers co-operative) and regularly seems to make savings compared with alternative suppliers.  Go to Oil CAN for more information and an application form.