Hosepipe Ban Could Cost Water Companies £792 Million as in-bound Customer Calls Surge

Posted on April 2, 2012. Filed under: CRM, customer complaints management, customer relationship management, customer service, Customer services, hosepipe ban, OFGEM, Technology, utilities, water | Tags: #cdcsoftware, #customercomplaints, #customerservice, #custserv, #fines, #hosepipe, #ofgem, #poorcustomerservice, #regulator, #utilities, #water |

2 April 2012: Calls to customer services teams at the UK’s 25 water companies have surged following the announcement that seven water companies in southern and eastern England will be implementing bans from 5 April, with further regions on high alert. The impact on customer service teams has been significant.

The average hosepipe related enquiry is taking 10 minutes to resolve, at a cost of £12 per customer, on top of the expected daily call levels. However, this cost and administrative pressure is not necessary.

Customer analysis has identified a common question: “What impact will the hosepipe ban have on me?”

Having established the key customer concern, it would be far more effective, both in terms of cost and administration, for the water companies to take a proactive approach to customer management. With the technology now available there is no excuse for customers to feel ill-informed and therefore for huge spikes in call numbers in the event of a planned service change, such as the hosepipe ban.

“It is very easy and cost effective to proactively communicate with high volumes of customers, quickly and accurately via letter, email, SMS and social media,” explained Rob Gillam, consultant to the utilities sector, CDC Respond.

“Service providers must use the intelligence provided by customers to pre-empt issues and communicate. Not only will this limit the number of repeat enquiries, the more informed a customer is, the less likely they are to escalate an enquiry to a complaint. This not only reduces the administrative burden, it ensures that the customer management process remains compliant with the requirements of the regulator,” continued Rob Gillam.

From a regulatory perspective it is vital that customers are happy with the communications. OFWAT, the water regulator is increasingly taking action against water companies that provide poor customer service and inadequate complaints management processes.

Whilst the water ban is an environmental consequence, how the provider manages the restrictions will impact compliance and could open the company up to a considerable fine, in addition to the increased administrative costs.

For more information on proactive customer complaints management visit http://www.cdcrespond.com; email: rgillam@cdcrespond.com or Twitter: @cdcrespondrob

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