Rise in complaints from energy customers

Friday, 12 September 2003 12:00 AM

Energy providers are performing worse than ever if the level of customer criticism is anything to go by.

energywatch revealed today that it had received 110,000 complaints in the last year, most of which came from domestic consumers although there was also a "massive increase" in the number of complaints from the business sector.

Domestic complaints, which represent over 92% of those received, were up by nearly 20% on the previous year. Most related to billing and account problems, with transfer complaints following closely behind. And there was still a significant proportion of complaints about energy companies' sales tactics despite recent high-profile criticism of unscrupulous practices.

Ann Robinson, chair of energywatch commented: "We remain deeply concerned about the scale of the problems consumers face when dealing with their energy companies."

Ms. Robinson added: "This is a real indictment of the performance of energy suppliers."

energywatch has also noted that small and medium-sized businesses are "extremely vulnerable" because of the complex contractual arrangements they have with suppliers and because they have less consumer protection than domestic customers.

The watchdog has claimed that since privatisation suppliers have been too busy with aggressive marketing campaigns to attend to basic customer care.

Energy providers have pointed out that hundreds of thousands of account transfers take place every week, and that the number of complaints therefore comes from a relatively small proportion of customers.

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