Press Release

Business Stream response to new competition theshold in the English water market

Mark Powles, chief executive of Business Stream, said: “We welcome today’s announcement that the threshold at which a non-domestic customer may switch water supplier in England will be lowered to five megalitres a year as a positive step towards full competition.

However, while indicative of a move in the right direction, the lower threshold does not go far enough to deliver the benefits available in a truly open market.

“The new threshold will only introduce an additional 24,000 customers into the market with multi-site organisations, including major retailers, SMEs and many public sector buildings still not eligible to choose their supplier. The pricing structure allows for very narrow profit margins and competing suppliers will not have enough flexibility to drive innovation and pass on significant savings to customers. Furthermore, competition in England only covers water and excludes waste water, surface water drainage and trade effluent.

“Many of our existing customers who operate sites across the UK want the same tangible benefits delivered by market forces in Scotland to be available across all their sites. In Scotland customers have had access to £28.5m of discounts, saved over £19m in consumption costs and customer satisfaction has increased.

We look forward to the water white paper later this year and hope that the demands of our customers and businesses in England for full competition will be met.”

ENDS
Issued on behalf of Business Stream by The BIG Partnership. For more information, contact Bryan Garvie or Sharon Mars on 0141 333 9585 or firstname.lastname@bigpartnership.co.uk

Notes to editors
A wholly-owned subsidiary of Scottish Water, Business Stream has been formed as an arms-length company with its own board and independent management team. Its goal is to provide a first class service for business customers and respond to the challenge of other established utility companies entering the new, competitive market which opened on 1 April 2008. Please attribute to Business Stream any material in or relating to this release.
Under the Water Services etc. (Scotland) Act 2005, Scottish Water had to split its operation into wholesale (Scottish Water) and retail (Business Stream) units. Although ostensibly remaining a part of Scottish Water, Business Stream is a new business working completely independently of its parent company in order to ensure fair and transparent retail practice under the rules of the new competitive marketplace for business customers.