Published December 30, 2008

Utilities rebates of $70-210 for HDB homes in 2009

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MORE than 780,000 eligible HDB households will receive $125 million worth of Utilities-Save (U-Save) rebates in 2009, the Ministry of Finance said yesterday.

Households will receive between $70 and $210 worth of U-Save rebates, depending on flat type. Part of the rebates will be given out in January, while the rest will be given in July.

Under the schedule of U-Save rebates released yesterday, one-room and two-room HDB flats will get $210 worth of rebates in 2009.

Three-room flats will get $190; four-room flats, $180; and five-room flats, $110. Executive flats will get rebates of $70.

The U-Save rebates are part of the $4 billion GST Offset Package announced in the 2007 Budget to help Singaporeans, especially low and middle-income households, cope with the increase in the goods and services tax (GST) in July 2007. The GST was increased by two percentage points to 7 per cent then.

The rebates will cost the government about $620 million over five years (FY2007-FY2011), it said.

'U-Save rebates will be used to offset utility charges directly. The amount of U-Save rebates will be reflected in the utility bills for January and July 2009 for all eligible households,' said the Ministry of Finance yesterday.

Electricity bills were hiked by about 21 per cent in October - the highest one-time increase in about seven years.

The government's U-Save rebates aim to provide relief for the higher electricity bills.