Entitlements

The Priority Services Register: who qualifies, and why one sign-up is not enough

By Alan Redbourn. Published 5 September 2026. Sources checked between 29 August 2026 and 2 September 2026.

The Priority Services Register is free, and it is not one list. Each energy supplier and each network operator keeps its own, so joining one does not put you on the others, and switching supplier drops you off.¹ Water companies run their own too.²

That single fact is the whole point of this page. Joining one company's register tells the others nothing.

Who can ask to join

Ofgem states you can ask to join your supplier's or your network operator's Priority Services Register if you:¹

• have reached state pension age
• are pregnant
• have young children
• struggle with speaking or reading English
• are living with disabilities or long-term medical conditions

Nothing there asks for proof of income and nothing there is means tested.

What you actually get

Ofgem lists the services as priority support in an emergency where possible, advance notice of scheduled power cuts, an identification and password scheme, the ability to nominate someone to receive communications and bills, the chance to move a prepayment meter, regular meter reading services, account information and bills in large print or braille, and assistance reconnecting a gas supply.¹

Two of those are worth reading twice. The identification and password scheme is the one that stops a stranger at the door claiming to be from the network. Advance notice of scheduled cuts is the one that lets a household on medical equipment plan rather than react.

Why one sign-up is not enough

Ofgem states that a household with different suppliers for gas and electricity must contact them separately, and that a household which switches supplier must ask to join the new supplier's register.¹

So a household that switched electricity supplier last spring has probably fallen off. Nobody writes to tell you. The register is not a status you hold, it is a record each company keeps about you, and a new company starts with no record.

Make the list and work through it. Electricity supplier. Gas supplier, if it is a different one. Electricity network operator. Water company.² Ofgem states that similar free services exist in the water, telecoms and public transport sectors as well.¹

The register that pays

The water one has money attached. From 1 October 2025 a household on a water company's priority services register is owed £100 where the company fails to provide the priority services it has committed to.³ That is recorded for England. It is the only one of these registers that carries its own compensation figure.

Where to start

The Priority Services Register site is at thepsr.co.uk.² Then call each company on your list. It is a phone call each, once, and then again whenever you switch.

Questions