The EDF heat pump tariff offers a free month of electricity and a £1,500 guarantee – is it right for you?

EDF has launched a heat pump package with one month’s free electricity and a £1,150 seven-year warranty and service package.

The Heat Pump and Power Tracker package also offers six hours of cheaper electricity every day at certain times and has no exit fees.

The package offer is intended to help improve the deal for households switching from traditional gas boilers to heat pumps.

The new deal may look tempting, but it has some conditions that mean it may not be the right option for everyone.

Here’s everything you need to know about the new deal, as well as who it may be best suited for.

How does the deal work?

Customers must register by December 31, 2024 and completely go off gas to get free electricity in December 2025.

Consumers must obtain a heat pump from Ideal Heating and have it installed by EDF Heat Pumps, with a deposit paid by December 31, 2024.

The heat pump will probably cost between £3,000 and £4,000, plus installation.

However, households interested in the package can apply for grants of up to £7,500 from the Government’s Boiler Upgrade Scheme.

The heat pump itself must be installed by September 30, 2025.

To be eligible, homes must also have a smart meter, opt for meter reading every half hour and pay by direct debit.

Once the heat pump is installed, customers get a £1,150 service and maintenance package.

This includes four in-person services and three remote services, and a warranty that lasts seven years.

If a remote survey detects any concerns, Ideal Heating will perform another in-person service free of charge.

The agreement also involves a three-year subscription fee for Heat Pump and Power Tracker.

This deal follows Ofgem’s price cap, so the price paid for electricity will vary, as will daily charges.

However, households on this tariff get a 10p/kWh discount on the electricity unit rate between 4am and 7am and then between 1pm and 4pm every day.

Who is this agreement suitable for?

The Heat Pump and Power Tracker package may be attractive for a variety of reasons, depending on the customer.

Firstly, it offers an “out of the box” way to switch to a heat pump without having to do too much trouble yourself.

Another attraction is that consumers can pay electricity bills equal to or significantly lower than Ofgem’s maximum price for three years, and can exit with no exit fees if they wish.

Another peculiarity of this tariff is that households pay the same unit rates for electricity as everyone else during peak hours and then save money for energy used during off-peak hours.

By comparison, most other heat pump tariffs offer larger discounts for off-peak energy and then increase costs at peak times.

The 10p/kWh discount offered by EDF is still quite substantial, with the average household with a capped price agreement currently paying unit rates of 24.5p/kWh, although this varies depending on factors such as where you live.

However, this is a smaller discount than that available on rival deals such as Scottish Power (15p/kWh) and Octopus (11.83p/kWh).

But consumers with both of these deals would pay more for maximum power – an average of 25.649p/kWh with Scottish Power and up to 37.5p/kWh with Octopus (between 4pm and 7pm).

In other words, the savings available from the EDF deal are lower than some of its rivals, but the penalties for peaking energy use are also lower.

EDF Customer Managing Director Philippe Commaret said: “By working closely with Ideal Heating on our Heat Pump and Power Tracker tariff package, we hope to help more customers install sustainable and energy-efficient solutions and, in doing so, enable them to achieve significant cash and carbon savings.”