Southern Water still at the bottom

Southern Water has notched up the most written complaints of any water company in the country for the fifth year in a row – despite the total almost halving.

The firm received 8,733 grievances from customers in 2016/17, down from 15,797 the previous year.

But government watchdog the Consumer Council for Water (CCW) says Southern Water has a lot more work to do to curb the number of complaints it receives.

Although the council is encouraged by the improvement, Southern Water does not go far enough, according to the CCW’S London and South East chairman.

Sir Tony Redmond said: “We are encouraged by Southern’s improvement but its performance remains poor in comparison to the rest of the industry.

“There is a lot more work to be done by the company.”

Southern Water’s chief customer officer, Simon Oates, says the firm’s teams have worked hard to get to this point.

He said: “I am pleased we are the most improved company across the industry in terms of achieving the largest reduction in written complaints.

“Despite this 45% reduction we are still at the foot of the industry league tables, so we’ll continue to work closely with our colleagues at CCW to drive forward further improvements and move up the rankings.”