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More than half of English businesses are set to switch water supplier in 2017.
Now that customers have experienced switching suppliers within the deregulated energy market, this will negate any uncertainty that existed years ago with changing utility suppliers, utility management consultancy Utilitywise has predicted.
This is likely to lead to incumbent water companies haemorrhaging hundreds of thousands of business customers when the market opens next year.
A Utilitywise-sponsored survey exposed “widespread dissatisfaction” with value and service provided by current water suppliers, with 38 per cent of respondents saying that they pay too much.
When informed about water deregulation, 74 per cent of respondents said they are likely to switch, compared with the 37 per cent of companies with little knowledge of the upcoming changes.
When asked about the reasons for switching supplier, 56 per cent of respondents said they want “a better price”, nearly 1 in 4 (22 per cent) want “better customer service” and a quarter (26 per cent) want “a supplier they can trust”. The survey suggested only 19 per cent of businesses are happy with their current supplier.
Utilitywise head of water market strategy James Duncan said: “Everything is up for grabs next year as businesses across England seize control of their water supply arrangements for the first time.
“Many water suppliers risk being caught short as business customers will no longer have to tolerate poor customer service and lack of competition. By exercising their right to switch supplier, small and medium-sized businesses finally have a choice and will benefit from a fundamental reshaping of the market.”
He added: “These survey results are a wake-up call to suppliers in the English market. Our experience of the impact of deregulation in the Scottish market shows that the incumbent supplier lost around 50 per cent of its market share for reasons very similar to those highlighted in this survey.
“There are over 1.2 million businesses in the English market who will be able to choose their water supplier from April 2017 onwards. This means that the most progressive, innovative, service-oriented suppliers have a fantastic opportunity to raise the service, trust and value bar and win hundreds of thousands of new customers in 2017 and beyond.”
The survey was conducted between 13 and 20 October 2016 by Edelman Intelligence. It included a main sample of business decision-makers from England (453), which is representative in terms of region and business size.
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