Don’t let people suffer in silence
We know that repeat low pressure and supply interruptions are impacting tens of thousands of customers every year.
Although we know water companies work hard to address these issues, we are not confident that the industry is currently engaging with and focusing on those worst served water customers in an effective or consistent way. It is therefore unlikely that many companies can accurately identify those customers that suffer repeat issues when it comes to their water supply.
Don’t suffer in silence
We believe everyone should be able to expect a reliable water supply. However, every year, tens of thousands of customers are suffering in silence and are affected by repeated low pressure and supply interruptions.
Our factsheets explain what you should do if you are experiencing signs of low water pressure or if you have no water supply.
What we have achieved
- A better understanding of the reasons people do not speak up about supply issues.
- A successful community drop-in session that will be the template for future events.
- Created a best practice framework for repeat victims of supply issues to be prioritised by companies.
- Overall the majority of companies have responded positively to our campaign through either adopting our recommendations or putting in place a timescale for them to be implemented. We will be checking in with all companies over the coming year to ensure that this work continues and customers who are speaking up about supply issues receive consistently high standards of service
Summary of the most common reasons people suffer in silence
Through a combination of research, community work and insights from complaints we have created a report that outlined the top five things stopping people from speaking up about supply issues. It revealed that many customers are often not fully aware of what they can expect when they encounter supply problems. We often see private issues being raised as a complaint, with the details, including ownership of pipework not being clearly explained to customers by companies.
We also found incidents where a relatively straightforward complaint about water pressure had taken a long time to resolve has been due to an absence of case management, with some water companies not even visiting a property to investigate.