Have you ever wanted to know how your water company’s performance compares to others? How much you pay for your water compared to other people? How they rate on leakage and their environmental performance?
Did you know that we flush away 3,909 tonnes of sewage a day, which is equivalent to the weight of 328 double decker buses? Or that water companies take 15,827 litres a water a day from the environment, that’s 198 million baths, just to fulfil our needs?
You can now find all that information and much more on the Discover Water website.
Why do you need to know? I can’t do anything about it I hear you say. I can’t change my water company. Well yes and no. You may not be able to switch supplier (unless you’re a business in England from April 2017), but you can hold your company to account for their performance.
This is why it’s vital that you have access to all the information you need in one place that is easy to use. That’s why the website, which has been referred to as a world leader in terms of transparent, well designed, easily navigable information has been launched.
At Ofwat we’ve always gathered and released much of this information, so that in itself is not new. But what is new is that organisations from across the water sector, including regulators, government, the consumer watchdog and water companies have joined together to combine all their information and provide it in a format that people can easily access. This is really important because it gives you a chance to influence.
How?
Well very soon we’ll be starting our process looking at the prices water companies can charge you from 2020 and the service you should get. Excuse the jargon, but we call this our price review 2019 (PR19). During this process, water companies have to speak to you about what you want, how happy you are with the service, what needs to change and what you are prepared to pay for your bills. How can you respond if you don’t know how what you get compares to other people? Well now you will know. You can see what good service looks like. And you can hold your water company to account if they are not performing as well as others.
So please use it. It’s your shop window, your view into the world of water, your chance to influence what happens.
Trevor Bishop
Director, Strategy and Policy