Ofwat, the water industry regulator, has warned that they will immediately fully enforce its customer protection Code of practice from April 1st, warning new players not to expect any ‘settling in time’.
The regulator has set out clear standards which fully protects the customer after market opening and if retailers do not comply with those standards, enforcement action will be taken – which could include revoking their licence.
Ofwat wants every customer to feel confident that the open market will bring them benefits and ‘any thought of relaxing’ the code leaves too much room for error and could impact customer perception of the new water market.
It’s clear that businesses looking to participate in the newly opened market need to focus on good processes, following the Code to the letter, as well as great customer service in order to succeed and to prepare for domestic opening in 2020.
Ofwat will be closely monitoring company performance and will report on this every 3 to 5 months.
We wish all of our clients good luck in this transitional period, and look forward to working with them through the coming months.
