About our businesses - South West Water
CUSTOMERS, COMMUNITY AND EMPLOYEES
HEALTH AND SAFETY PERFORMANCE
The health, safety and welfare of South West Water's employees remain paramount in all its activities. The company has a health and safety strategy which focuses on providing strong leadership, engaging with employees, building competence and measuring performance. These principles are promoted by a health and safety steering group including a cross-section of the company's directors, managers and employee representatives.
Occupational health and safety are key elements of South West Water's risk management and internal control processes. We continue to pursue initiatives to improve further the welfare of the company's employees through the provision of training on, and promotion of, good health and safety practices.
RIDDOR accidents and incidents per 1,000 employees totalled 13 in 2009 compared with 21 in 2008 and we welcome this improvement.
CUSTOMERS
South West Water has consulted with customers about its priorities for 2010-2015 and this feedback has been central to the development of customer service improvement plans to deliver its Pure Water, Pure Service and Pure Environment strategy.
Providing help and support to customers in need is at the heart of the company's Pure Service strategy and accordingly the company remains an industry leader in the provision of priority services to vulnerable customers. In 2009/10 the company helped thousands of such customers with reading their meters or by providing extra help in an emergency.
'WaterCare', the company's industry-leading programme to support customers who have difficulty in paying their bills, completed a third successful year. Since the start of the programme over 7,000 customers have been helped with benefit entitlement checks, tariff advice and water-saving measures.
The WaterCare programme has been commended by the Government.
Customers are kept informed about our services through 'WaterLevel' (our company newspaper), leaflets, the media and our website southwestwater.co.uk Consultation with customers and stakeholders has an influence on the improvements made to our literature and website as we seek to provide information of interest in increasingly accessible ways.
The company meets regularly with the Consumer Council for Water (CCWater), which champions the interests of water customers. It consults with CCWater and other stakeholders such as pensioners' forums and Citizens Advice, prior to introducing major changes or initiatives.
CUSTOMER SATISFACTION OVERALL
South West Water's 'Customer Plus' programme is transforming the customer experience with the aim of making it amongst the best in the industry. In 2009/10 customer contact performance improved significantly. The number of complaints about billing, charges and water and sewerage services has fallen.
CUSTOMER SATISFACTION CALL HANDLING
Ofwat measures the overall manner in which a customer call is handled. The measure is obtained by quarterly tracking surveys undertaken by an independent company engaged and managed by Ofwat. The data is averaged for the year to assess a performance trend. For 2009/10 the satisfaction score was 4.53 (2008/09 4.5). The maximum score is 5.0.
The company continues to promote the efficient use of water with advice and practical support for householders and non-domestic customers. An education programme for schools has also been developed this year to extend the spread and reach of this work. As part of the WaterCare programme and to investigate customers' high water consumption queries, 2,831 audits were completed in 2009/10 (2008/09 3,088).
South West Water continues to support business customers through water efficiency reviews, waste minimisation projects, providing advice for water management plans and by highlighting opportunities for reduction, re-use or alternative sources of supply.
Business customers continue to have access to a secure online system which tracks and displays consumption on their sites. South West Water's 'Business Accounts Online' also offers a water efficiency calculator with a free water audit. Since the launch of the calculator tool in November 2007 211 businesses with over 7,250 water service accounts have registered to use the water efficiency element of this service.
OVERALL PERFORMANCE ASSESSMENT
The Overall Performance Assessment (OPA) index is maintained by Ofwat as a comparative tool to measure companies' performance. The OPA is based on performance in areas such as customer service, complaint handling, billing, debt collection, asset serviceability, environmental compliance and quality of drinking water delivered. In 2008/09 South West Water's performance moved to eighth place amongst the ten water and sewerage companies (seventh in 2007/08).
Ofwat has announced that OPA will be replaced with a new measure of water industry customer performance, called the Service Incentive Mechanism. 2010/11 data will be reported on this new basis.
COMMUNITY, CORPORATE RESPONSIBILITY AND SPONSORSHIP
South West Water concentrates its sponsorship on community projects and organisations within its service area which are linked to water, benefit the environment or promote youth participation.
Highlights in 2009/10 included the staging of a series of environmental walks with Cornwall Wildlife Trust around the coastline to mark the completion of a pipe replacement scheme at Looe and sponsoring the 'Nipper' youth championships of the Surf Life Saving Association of Great Britain at Falmouth.
Other supported events ranged from the TRAIL environmental art sculpture festival on the South West Coast Path between Dawlish and Shaldon and the opening of Pynes water treatment works, Brokenbury waste water treatment works and Mary Tavy hydro power station for guided public tours during the national Heritage Open Days.
For the third year the company also co-sponsored South West Tourism's annual awards and funded the sustainable tourism prize. This demonstrates how its 'Clean Sweep' project has helped underpin the renaissance of tourism, the region's number one industry.
The company is proud to support the water industry charity, WaterAid, through sponsorship and many other fund-raising activities such as the publication of a calendar featuring water-themed photographs taken by Group employees.
South West Water achieved a 'Green Apple' award for transforming a disused sludge lagoon into a pond for wildlife with a number of other habitat improvements around its water treatment works site at Tottiford, near Bovey Tracey. This project was shortlisted as a finalist in the Community Campaign of the Year category of the Water Industry Achievement Awards. This recognises the way South West Water engaged with adults with learning difficulties for the supply of bat, bird and dormouse boxes now fitted across the site.
EMPLOYEES
South West Water's people strategy continues to focus on recruiting and developing individuals who can support the delivery of the company's 'Pure' vision, enabling the provision of a high quality service to customers and the achievement of operational efficiencies.
Technical and managerial skills training have underpinned the company's Puros project. A range of other learning programmes to support the development of customer facing and operational skills continue to form a fundamental part of our strategy.
Employee involvement and participation in all aspects of business and organisational change is encouraged and supported through the company's Staff Council and craft and industrial consultative forums.