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Ofwat
Customers registered with water and sewerage companies for special assistance Under the Water Act 2003 the Director General of Water Services has a duty to take account of the interests of those who are disabled, chronically sick or of pensionable age. Due to their age, disability or illness, some customers require special assistance in the way water and sewerage services are delivered to them. In March 2001 Ofwat published 'Services for disabled or elderly customers – revised guidance to the water and sewerage companies'. This sets out guidance to water and sewerage companies on the essential elements of company policy and procedures to meet the needs of these customers. Examples of services that companies should offer include: password schemes to prevent bogus callers; issue of bills and associated literature in other formats (for example, large print or braille); special arrangements to communicate with customers requiring special assistance in case of an emergency; and a meter resiting service to ensure these customers can monitor their water consumption. The guidelines also set out that each company should maintain accurate and up-to-date records of customers who have expressed a need for specific assistance. The register is important as it is designed to ensure that customers receive the specialised service they require. WaterVoice (CCWater from 1 October 2005) has recently conducted a review of the changes and progress companies have made in the way they promote, target and deliver services for disabled or elderly customers. This work follows on from the review which WaterVoice undertook in June 2003 and will be published shortly. Number of customers registered for special assistance in 2004-05 In our Forward Programme 2005-06 to 2007-08 we said we would publish the number of customers registered with companies as requiring special services. The table below shows the number of customers registered for special assistance in each water company. We do not collect details on the forms of assistance customers receive, although companies are asked to ensure that customers receiving more than one service are not counted more than once. In 2004-05, 76,149 customers were recorded on companies' registers. This figure is nearly 12% higher than the figure reported in 2003-04 (67,858). Companies tell us that this is because of increased promotion of the register and networking with other organisations such as Age Concern, the Police and RNIB. Of those companies reporting decreases this was primarily due to data cleansing exercises where duplicate records have been eliminated, or where customers have moved away, or no longer require the assistance.
September 2005 Number of customers registered for special assistance – 2003-04 and 2004-05
(1) This shows the number of customers registered for special assistance per 10,000 households billed for water in 2004-05.  | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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