While demanding better service and negotiating the price of goods is essentially a basic right, this has historically not applied to water users, but this is about to change drastically.
It has already changed for water users in Scotland and since the introduction of new legislation into the Water Act in 2014, the same will soon apply to consumers in England. As of 2017, all business customers, regardless of water use, will be able to choose their retail service provider.
English Water Market Fully Open to Competition in 2017
With April 2017, the date that the English market will be fully open fast approaching, companies are already utilising Scotland as preparation for competition in England by going through a process of water supply procurement.
The Open Water programme was set up by the UK Government to deliver the competitive market by April 2017, but are there still vital pieces of the puzzle missing? When the non-domestic water retail market in England opens to competition and business customers will be able to choose who supplies their water and wastewater services, what will happen?
Alan Sutherland, the Scottish water regulator and Thames Water Commercial Services’ (TWCS) managing director Graham Southall agree that there is still a lot to be done, but as the Scottish model is being used as a template for the English retail market, everyone is confident that that the sector will be able to open the market on time.
The move is set to create some of the substantial changes in the water and waste water industry since privatisation over 25 years ago. A big motivation for companies to switch water supplier is price, while other factors include water consumption reduction.
Up until now, the water market in England has generally been operated as a number of regional monopolies, which has often resulted in non-household customers with more than one site having to deal with a hotchpotch of different suppliers, resulting in dissatisfaction with customer service, non-standardised billing, and high costs in dealing with transactions.
It is hoped that when there is open competition the costs will come down, billing will become standardised, and there will be a higher level of customer satisfaction.
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