customer service

Energy suppliers lost more than £5.2 billion last year as poor service led customers to switch to rival firms. New statistics from Ombudsman Services reveal one in 10 complaints – a total of 5.5 million – in the UK in 2016 were related to energy companies. Around 16% of people surveyed said they resigned due […]

In a sector low on trust how do you keep hold of customers? Ken McCaig, Head of Retention at Total Gas & Power, says it’s all about being agile, flexible and, most importantly, transparent. He proudly boasts of a 99% customer retention rate for I&C (large business) customers who deal directly with them, a staggering […]

OVO Energy has agreed to pay £58,000 after its agents missed appointments with customers or turned up late. Around £54,000 will be paid in redress as it failed to compensate customers when the incidents occurred in 2014. The rest of the money will be given to charity Step Change to help energy customers in debt. […]

Co-operative Energy has agreed to pay £1.8 million to its customers for failing on service. Part of the amount – £1.6 million – has already been paid while the remainder is due to be compensated to some customers. The money the supplier is unable to return to consumers will go to charity StepChange, which will […]

Utilities have been ranked as the second-worst industry for customer service. This year’s Customer Experience Survey from service design consultancy, Engine, has revealed this is the case for the second year in a row. Around 36% of customers said utilities is one of the worst three sectors for customer service, 5% more than last year. Public […]

ScottishPower has agreed to pay £18 million for failing to treat its customers fairly. It follows an investigation by Ofgem into the Big Six supplier’s complaint resolution, call handling and billing processes, which were found to be “inadequate”. The energy firm’s customer service issues, during and following its new IT system, resulted in more than […]

The Big Six energy suppliers are still providing a “poor level” of customer service. Three of them failed to meet the overall average customer score of 53%, according to a survey by Which? npower received the lowest score for the sixth year running for customer satisfaction, with 41% of the votes. The remaining suppliers with the […]

Energy company npower has been ordered to pay £26 million for failing to treat customers fairly. Ofgem said the Big Six supplier’s billing issues, following the introduction of a new IT system in 2011, affected more than 500,000 customers between September 2013 and December last year. Some affected customers received inaccurate bills “with little or […]

An independent heat customer protection scheme has been launched in the UK. Heat Trust sets standards in key areas including performance, reliability and customer service. It claims more than 15,000 customers will benefit from free independent complaint resolution and minimum service standards. The programme is backed by the Association for Decentralised Energy (ADE) and the Energy […]

British Gas insists its customers’ data that was leaked yesterday has been caused by “someone external”. The e-mail addresses and passwords of more than 2,000 British Gas customers appeared online yesterday, which was found during routine online checks. The Big Six company sent e-mails to its customers assuring their systems are secure and no payment data has […]