Ofwat is consulting on a proposal to grant Albion Water a variation to its appointment to enable it to provide water and sewerage services to a site called Rissington, in Gloucestershire.
The proposal would allow Albion Water to supply water and sewerage services to 368 new household properties, and sewerage services only to a further 370 existing household properties.
New appointments and variations include one company replacing another as the statutory supplier for a specific geographic area. Albion Water will serve its customers by taking a bulk supply of water from Thames Water. It will provide a sewerage service itself by operating existing on-site sewerage infrastructure.
Albion Water proposes to match both the fixed and volumetric potable water charges and fixed sewerage services charges of Thames Water, while charging its customers for sewerage services a 5% discount on the volumetric charges of Thames Water. Ofwat is satisfied that Albion Water will offer customers on the site at least equivalent levels of service to Thames Water.
In May 1999, Albion Water obtained a new appointment as a water undertaker for the Shotton Paper Mill in Dŵr Cymru’s area. Since then Ofwat has granted a further appointment for Albion Water to provide sewerage services only to household customers at the Knowle Village site in Southern Water’s area.
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Notes to Editors:
- Ofwat (The Water Services Regulation Authority) is the economic regulator of water and sewerage companies in England and Wales. It exercises its powers in a way that it judges will protect the interests of consumers, promote value and safeguard future water and sewerage services by allowing efficient companies to carry out their functions properly, and finance them.
- New appointments and variations are the route by which one company replaces another as the appointed water and/or sewerage company for a specified area. The replacement water and sewerage company will have all of the same duties and responsibilities as the previous statutory water and sewerage company for the specified area.
- There are three qualifying criteria for seeking a new appointment or variation:
- an area does not contain any premises that receive services from an appointed water or sewerage company (it is ‘unserved’);
- a customer uses (or is likely to use) at least 50 million litres of water a year (in England) or 250 million litres of water a year (in Wales) at each of its premises and wants to change its supplier (a ‘large user’); or
- the existing appointed company agrees to transfer part of its area to a different company (a transfer by ‘consent’).
- Media enquiries to the Ofwat Press Office: 0121 644 7642 / 7821 / 7616 / [email protected]