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Ofwat puts four companies on report for leakage failures.
Complaints to water companies have fallen by 20%in the past two years according to Ofwats 2010/11 “summary of performance” but says the regulator there are still areas for concern.
The annual study looks at 21 water companies within the UK, the highlights include the drop in complaints, a high level of customer satisfaction, drinking water quality to rival the best in Europe and a four year low in the number of incidents of properties where sewers have flooded internally.
However Ofwat said there was also cause for disappointment and concern. Six companies failed to meet their leakage targets – Anglian Water, Dwr Cymru (Welsh Water), Northumbrian Water (north east operating area) Severn Trent Water, Southern Water and Yorkshire Water. Southern Water missed it’s target by the widest margin at 16% followed by Yorkshire Water at 9%, Anglian Water at 8%, Northumbrian Water – North East and Dwr Cymru both with 5% and Severn Trent Water at 3%. Southern Water, Yorkshire Water and Northumbrian Water – North East all missed their targets in 2009 / 10 as well.
Ofwat did stress that 15 companies had met their leakage targets reducing leakage by a total of 18ml/d (million litres per day), putting that into perspective that’s enough water to supply a city the size of Exeter. However Ofwat said steps need to be taken to ensure all 21 meet their targets going forward.
To this end Yorkshire Water has earmarked approximately £33m for tackling leakage and improving the pipe network, while Southern Water will return £5m to it’s customers for failing to deliver it’s leakage reduction targets.
Ofwat has put Anglian Water, Dwr Cymru, Northumbrian – North East and Severn Trent on report for their leakage failures.
In addition Ofwat stated Severn companies need to do more to maintain their underground infrastructure – Anglian, United Utilities, Northumbrian, Severn Trent, Southern, Veolia Water Central and Yorkshire Water as the number of supply interruptions to customers was high, specifically citing Severn Trent says it had “particular concerns about the performance” of the company in this regard.
Ofwat Chief Executive Regina Finn said ” Where we have concerns about companies performance we have made sure there are action plans in place to put the problem right, at no extra cost to customers. Customers tell us that leakage is an issue that matters to them, they need to have confidence that their company is doing their part to use water wisely, these failures send a poor signal about how companies value water. Leakage has reduced by around a third since it’s mid 90’s peak, most companies stepped up to the challenge of tackling leakage during another cold winter, but those who didn’t need to get back on track”
The regulator has also published the results of its customer service survey, the survey asked 17,000 customers to rate their provider on a scale of 1 – 5 (where 5 was very satisfied) the results were close with customer satisfaction generally high at an average across the country of 4.2.
Veolia Water East came top of the table with an average score of 4.59 while the lowest average score of 3.79 went to United Utilities.