Water2Business tops 2019-20 market performance chart

Water2Business led the pack on cyclic meter read peformance as the best performing larger retailer on Market Performance Standards (MPS) in new data out from MOSL for 2019-20. Some 90% of the standards relate to meter reads.

Water2Business completed 89.5% of tasks on time and as expected, closely followed by Affinity for Business (now part of Castle Water) at 87.5% and Pennon Water Services with 85.6%. SES Business Water, Wave and Castle Water sat at the bottom of the larger retailer table, with 78.8%, 75.7% and 71.8% respectively.

Overall the larger retailers (with a market wide score of 80.9%) were outperformed by smaller retailers with 87.6% and – the best performers of all – self suppliers with 92.7%, though it is worth noting that the larger retailers perform millions rather than thousands of tasks annually.

Yorkshire Water was the best performing wholesaler on MPS, with 97.1% of tasks completed on time and as expected, followed closely by Bristol Water with 95.3% and Wessex Water with 94.4%. MPS for wholesalers are more mixed, featuring activities like connections and disconnections as well as metering. At the bottom of the wholesaler table was Thames Water with 73.6%, with Northumbrian Water a little above with 76.6%.

On Operating Performance Standards – self reported data on bilateral transactions – Anglian Water was the top performer with 98.6%, followed very closely by United Utilities with 98.4%. Southern Water was bottom with 74.7%, just below Thames with 76.7%.

The new league tables were published alongside MOSL’s Annual Market Performance Report, out last week. The report acknowledged the new challenges trading parties face as a result of Covid 19, and recognised improvements delivered in the 2019/20 year including through the use of rectification plans, more collaboration and better data insight. But it also set out that previous years’ challenges had continued “with trading parties failing to meet the ambitious targets set at the beginning of 2019. As a result, customers are still not benefiting from many of the outcomes promised, in terms of the accuracy of their billing and levels of customer service”.