CCW: Largest water retailer skewing complaint handling improvement

There has been a decline in the number of customer complaints made to and about water retailers, according to CCW’s annual report, but the watchdog warns the same poor performers haunt the bottom of league tables.

Overall complaints to retailers were down 2% for the 12 months to March 2022 at 14,751 compared to 15,103 in the previous year. Total complaints to CCW fell 19% to 2,295 in the same period, showing more grievances were resolved by companies.

However the consumer body said Water Plus, SES Business Water and Clear Business Water, which were the lowest performing companies, had improvements to make.

It called on them to learn from complaint handling at those companies receiving the lowest written complaints and match their performance. Hafren Dyfrdwy, First Water Business, Water2Business and Welsh Water were at the top end of the league, which cover organisations with more than 5,000 supply points.

CCW said the numbers of complaints “only tell us part of the story” on performance among larger retailers, which it called very mixed. “Strong reductions in complaints to three of the four largest retailers – Castle Water, Business Stream and Wave – were significantly offset by a large increase in complaints to Water Plus.”

As the largest retailer in the sector Water Plus, which serves a quarter of all supply points, accounted for 56% of all complaints to CCW. However, this was down 16% on the previous year’s tally, at 12 complaints per 10,000 supply points. Complaints directly to the company were up 25%, to 110 per 10,000 supply points.

Andy Hughes, chief executive of Water Plus, said: “We’re very disappointed with the number of complaints and we’ll not stop our efforts with customers – and our additional actions – to reduce any areas where these can occur. A unique factor for us, in the last year, saw the introduction of two new wholesaler initiatives by Severn Trent and United Utilities to update information on site use in England and, under industry requirements, bringing customers into charge where they’re using water, with this work also contributing to complaints.

“Amongst other market measures, work by our team means we’re amongst the top three water retailers in market performance (MPS) scores at the start of this new financial year – and Customer Satisfaction scores have seen an upward trend, since October in independent survey results, with 70% of customers rating us as 5 Stars, out of 5, for General Satisfaction.”

The watchdog said it will continue to work with the Water Plus to reduce its complaints backlog and resolve resourcing issues.

Also in the bottom three, Clear Business Water saw direct complaints rise by 31% and SES Business Water received 40% more complaints. However, complaints escalated to CCW fell by 49% for Clear Business but rose by 6% for SES. Castle saw a fall of 21%, Business Stream drove down complaints by 27% and Wave fell by 38% year-on-year.

Emma Clancy, chief executive of CCW, said: “Businesses deserve a good service from their water retailer and while it is encouraging to see a further improvement in this area, written complaints are only one indicator of a customer’s overall experience of their retailer and the market.”

“With satisfaction, and willingness to engage, remaining low for most customers in England, it is clear that the fundamental problems in the market are far from resolved,” she said.

Complaints to CCW were dominated (72%) by issues relating to billing and charging with administration (15%), water and sewerage (6%) causing fewer grievances.

CCW will begin publishing quarterly data on its website for customers to compare the performance of retailers to inform decisions about switching.

The majority of complaints in the year were caused by the retailers themselves, however 26% overall had a wholesaler involvement.

Investigations prompted by serious unresolved problems fell from 36 to 23 in the year, which marks the lowest number since the market opened. CCW noted that Wave and Water Plus accounted for 19 of the investigations.