WWT ROUND TABLE 2009
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“It seems customer awareness involves trying to get
This point about engaging with customers in
this key process, which is setting the prices
them to help set the value of water”
– what am I getting for my money? Why is
the price going up? This is absolutely critical
We will try to work with local schools, that the water companies provide is better for the future sustainability of the industry.
businesses, local authorities and WWF in than that, in the customers’ view. If you
particular, to get people in Swindon to compare that with the value for money Bob Baty We are getting tight for time. Dan,
understand that every drop of water that point, it is much closer to the energy sector you are not as close to these issues as
comes out of their shower, their tap or their actually, despite the fact that the energy many of us around this table. You have
hosepipe comes from somewhere prices are three times as much as water. heard the tenor of the debate but how does
upstream, and that it is actually affecting It seems to me – and Martin Kaye has that appear to you as the sort of view that a
wildlife. We will link this to kingfishers and picked this up, as has Stephen Littlechild – customer might have? How does that chime
water voles and nice walks along the river that you actually need much greater with you, and how aware were you of these
bank, to see whether we can’t get that involvement of consumers in the price- sorts of issues?
kind of value for water, as well as the setting process. We have been encouraged
economic value. this time around in this price review by the Dan McCarthy It seems that customer
efforts that many companies have made to awareness involves trying to get them to
Stephen Bird Yes, we are environment and do that. It seems to me that that legitimises help set the value of water. This is
public health service providers. We are not their plans to a much greater extent than in something that I have heard this morning,
providing a commodity. We are compared the past. It still needs Ofwat, though, to which I think would be good. It is also a
with energy and gas and all those other agree to those legitimised plans because it question of getting people to understand
utilities, as if we are a commodity, and we can’t be that Ofwat makes the decisions what choices they are making about using
become sucked into the trap of using price about what customers want; customers the water. There is this environmental
as a common currency. Actually, however, need to make the decision about what project that you are talking about at Thames,
as Bob says, two-thirds of our bill – the they want. which is a very good one to help people to
biggest in the country – is all about Even if you have competition, that is only make the connection between what they
environmental protection. And yet, if you the retail part and there is actually a danger are doing and the impact that they have
ask the customer what registers there that this big monopoly part could potentially because this is not just a price issue. If you
when they pay their £450 a year bill, they become more aloof from its customers. I just try to deal with that on price, you may
would not even register that in the vast think they found this in energy, that the never get anywhere.
majority of cases. network operators and the transmission Waterefficiency is also an interesting
Unless you tell them what environmental companies are divorced and actually they issue with regard to setting new standards
and public health services you are providing, are trying to re-engage with the customers. on water use, in appliances, toilets and all
don’t be surprised if they keep coming back
to price and saying that it seems expensive
and that the price has gone up this year,
and complaining that it is terrible. That is a
brilliant example of trying to change that
psychological contract.
Richard Aylard If we can make it work and
if we can show that what we invest in it
actually gives a measurable reduction, then
we can start to get some arguments that
investment in water efficiency is actually
more least-cost than it is at the moment.
When you do water resource planning,
water efficiency schemes don’t come out as
least cost and they tend not to be
prioritised. That is because it is done on an
economic basis, and we all understand why.
However, if we can get better evidence, we
can start to move it forward.
Tony Smith What always strikes me about
what the customer thinks is what they think
about the service of the water industry,
which is extremely high. It is higher than that
of any other comparable industry – we
research it every year and it is much higher
than in the telecoms industry. The service Dan McCarthy: Water efficientcy is an interesting issue of setting new standards on use
June 2009 Round Table 21