Water and energy companies have been identified as among the lowest performing sectors when it comes to customer service in the bi-annual Institute of Customer Service UK Customer Satisfaction Index.
It comes as sector regulator Ofwat announced that it will intervene in water companies that fail to meet the needs of their customers and reach the “high bar” set out in business plans for PR19.
According to industry experts from Echo Managed Services, the latest findings should serve as a warning to water companies that they must act quickly to raise the level of service being offered to customers.
Monica Mackintosh, customer services director at Echo Managed Service, said the recent findings demonstrate how far the water industry has to go in order to meet Ofwat’s expected PR19 standards, whilst also closing the gap to the UK’s top customer service performers.
She said:
“While the utilities sector has experienced the largest growth in customer satisfaction, driven by higher scores for trust and transparency, it also has one of the greatest variations in customer satisfaction performance, with a nine point different between the highest and lowest scoring water companies.
“It’s positive to see four water companies achieving scores above the UK CSI National all sector average, but as a whole the sector has sat towards the bottom of performance tables for some time.
“The Institute of Customer Service report places great emphasis on customer service agents and complaint handling as being the crucial differentiators between organisations with good and bad customer service and backs up our own research about customer frustrations with their everyday service providers.”
Echo’s research found that poor customer service was a major reason for switching for 33% of people, while poor complaint handling contributed to 18% of customers looking to change service providers.
Monica Mackintosh added:
“Until domestic water services become competitive, consumer frustrations about poor service might not be the top priority across the sector, but Ofwat looks set on improving this by the introduction of new and stretching customer experience performance measures, drivingwater companies to become ‘competition ready’ regardless of the timetable for an open and competitive market.
“Our research also suggests water companies need to look to their wider corporate reputation in order to satisfy customers.
“It is not just on price and service that consumers are now expecting more, with our research showing that 12% of consumers would actually look to switch to more ‘ethical’ providers.
“By engaging their customer base and really listening, water companies willgain a better understanding of how they can improve and tailor customer engagement and services in line with Ofwat’s PR19 vision.
“Today’s customers are much more demanding and expectant that businesses will personalise services to fit them, not the other way around, and this is a major learning curve for a monopoly sector to navigate.”
For more information, visit www.echo-ms.com/
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