Awards

As well as saving our customers over £335 million since 2008, we’ve also won a few awards for our work in the water industry

Winner – Best Employer for Women (under 500 employees) – Women in Utilities Awards - 2024

We won this award in recognition of our commitment to embedding inclusion and diversity into our culture and values and implementing policies to help remove barriers and encourage the development of women.

Winner – Woman of the Year – Women in Utilities Awards – 2024

Our CEO, Jo Dow, won this award in recognition of her leadership skills and the contribution she’s made over the course of her career to the success of Business Stream and the wider industry, providing an inspirational role model for women in utilities. 

Winner – Mentor of the Year – Women in Utilities Awards – 2024

Our Head of ESG, Sophia Goring, received this award in acknowledgement of her commitment to going above and beyond as a mentor to support and develop the careers of young people both within and outside of the industry.

Gold – Emissions Reduction – International CSR Excellence Awards – 2024

The International CSR Excellence Awards recognise businesses that have strong ethical and sustainable approaches to doing business. We won a Gold award for our commitment to reducing our carbon footprint by 50% between April 2023-April 2024 as we work towards our 2030 net zero target.

Silver – Climate Change – International CSR Excellence Awards – 2024

This award recognises our efforts to reduce our environmental impact in response to the climate crisis, while remaining committed to helping our customers and suppliers to achieve their environmental goals.

Bronze – CSR Initiative – International CSR Excellence Awards – 2024

In 2019 we launched our vision to make a positive difference to our customers, our people, the environment and our local communities. Since then, we’ve launched over 35 initiatives to help bring our vision to life, including reducing our carbon footprint, investing in programmes that support skills and training for young people, establishing our Charity Panel and introducing a raft of measures to support the health and wellbeing of our people. We were given this award in recognition of our efforts to deliver our vision in order to help drive positive change.

Bronze – Water savings – International CSR Excellence Awards – 2024

Over the years we’ve developed innovative ways to help our customers save water, including launching our water efficiency fund for public sector customers in Scotland, developing our water stewardship programme and working in partnership with water wholesalers to deliver water efficiency support to local businesses. This award was given in recognition of our commitment to helping our customers reduce their water use and benefit from financial and environmental savings.

Winner – Better Society Awards - Carbon Reduction Programme of the Year – 2023

The Better Society Awards recognises businesses who are helping to create a better, more equal, ethical and sustainable world for all. We won the award for our commitment to reducing our impact on the environment by reducing our carbon footprint by 25% between April 2021-April 2022 and our ongoing commitment to achieve our ambition to be net zero by 2030.

Winner – CICM British Credit Awards – Giving Back Award – 2022

This award recognised our commitment to giving back through the launch and delivery of our vision to make a positive difference. Since launching our vision we’ve created our Charity Panel; developed our volunteering programme; and partnered with external organisations including Business in the Community (BiTC) and Career Ready to provide support to school students, school leavers, local businesses and charities.

Winner – HR Networks Award – Corporate Responsibility Award – 2022

This Award recognises those organisations who have implemented a highly successful and impactful corporate responsibility programme. We won the award in recognition of the positive and measurable benefits our vision to make a positive difference is having on our colleagues, the environment and our local communities.  

Highly Commendable – Water Industry Awards – Water Retailer of the Year – 2021

We received this award in recognition of our commitment to deliver for our customers; reduce our environmental impact; implement innovative initiatives; and support our people. Since launching our vision to make a positive difference in 2019 we have introduced a wide range of initiatives to support our ambitions and its fantastic that our commitment to our vision is being recognised.

Silver – ECCCSA – Most Effective Improvement Programme - 2021

This award recognises a business’ ability to implement a change in their process that has delivered significant improvements to the customer journey. We received this award for the delivery of our ‘Single-Site Onboarding Journey’, which we’ve introduced to help deliver a seamless and pro-active onboarding experience for new customers.

Bronze – CX Awards – Use of Insight and Feedback – 2020

Over the years we’ve introduced a range of innovative initiatives to help us expand and enhance our insight and feedback capabilities. Our commitment to understanding our customers’ needs has helped us make improvements to our service offering and delivered measurable improvements to our customer satisfaction scores.  

Gold - CX Awards – CX professional of the year - 2019

We know that to deliver a market leading customer experience we need to be innovative, agile and forward thinking with a deep understanding of our customers’ needs – and no one personifies that more than our Customer Operations Director, Jo Mayes. Through Jo’s unwavering championing of customers in our business, we have launched our ambitious 5-year Customer First Strategy, which is delivering real benefits to our customers.

We also won the Bronze awards for Best Utilities and Best Customer Centric Culture.

Gold - CX Awards – B2B customer experience - 2019

To support our vision of delivering a market leading customer experience, we’re now 3 years into our ambitious 5-year Customer First Strategy. Under the strategy we have developed our digital capability, identified and delivered innovative solutions and empowered our people to take ownership of end-to-end customer journeys. This award’s in recognition of the impact this strategy has had on the service we deliver and our customer experience scores.

Gold - ECCCSA - B2B customer experience award -2019

We’ve invested significantly in our customer experience capability, challenging ourselves to think differently to achieve our ambition to deliver a market leading customer experience. This award is in recognition of our Customer First Strategy, which is delivering innovative, customer centric solutions to enhance our service offering.

Silver - ECCCSA - Using customer insights to deliver our CX ambitions - 2019

Over the past three years we have developed our digital capability, delivered innovative solutions and empowered our people, all led by customer insight. This award recognises the importance we’ve placed on customer insight and our ability to use this feedback to deliver a measurable improvement to both our employee engagement and customer experience scores.

Gold - UK Business Awards - Business Change or Transformation - 2018

The English market opening in 2017 created significant opportunities for us to support large multi-site customers. We wanted to improve their joining experience to ensure we were creating strong, long term relationships. Working in partnership with Capgemini we transformed our on-boarding process and delivered an innovative, market first AI solution using Robot Process Automation (RPA) which has helped us exceed customer expectations.

Silver - UK Business Awards - Customer Centric Culture - 2018

Throughout our organisation we’ve implemented new ideas and market leading technology to embed a customer centric culture. This award highlights just a few of the successful customer centric projects delivered in the past year. We’ve launched the My Business Stream app, digital service capability and developed our operating model to enable our people to take full ownership of our customer experience.

UK Business Awards - Utilities Category - 2018

Over the past 18 months, we have delivered a clear customer first strategy. We’ve delivered innovative, customer centric solutions that have enabled us to improve the experience we deliver to our customers. This included robotic technology and a customer app. In recognition of this, we were awarded winner of the Utilities Category at the UK Business Awards 2018.

Gold - European Contact Centre & Customer Service Awards - Best Customer Service Team - 2018

After demonstrating a long-term focus on providing exceptional support to customers with complex issues, our customer experience team was awarded Best Customer Service Team at the European Contact Centre and Customer Service Awards. The team has developed actionable CX measurement using root cause analytics across all customer touch points to transform the customer experience and improve service levels.

Silver - European Contact Centre & Customer Service Awards -Best Implementation of AI in Customer Service - 2018

Investing in robotic technology has seen Business Stream awarded this international prize. We accelerated customer onboarding by implementing Robotic Process Automation within our processes to streamline the onboarding experience for large, multi-site customers. This project was delivered in partnership with Cap Gemini, a global leader in consulting, technology and digital transformation.

International Customer Experience Awards - Best Digital Transformation Strategy Winner - 2018

In partnership with Cap Gemini, we received this top prize at the International Customer Experience Awards. Judges recognised the innovative approach to customer service, in particular onboarding, that we’ve taken in the past year. This has been crucial in enhancing our onboarding process for large, multi-site customers. The award also recognised our commitment to aligning our customer service tools with the latest automated technology.

Living Wage Scotland Awards - Employee Choice - 2018

Business Stream won the coveted Employee Choice Award at the Living Wage Scotland Awards. We were nominated by a contact advisor based at our Edinburgh Headquarters. As a proud living wage employer, this award recognises our commitment to providing employees with the best possible support and opportunities to ensure they can develop their careers at Business Stream.

Gold - UK Customer Experience Awards - Best Utilities - 2018

Business Stream was awarded Gold in the Best Utilities category for the delivery for a Customer Experience Transformation Programme including the launch of the My Business Stream App, implementation of a digital ‘virtual assistant’ and a market first AI on-boarding solution fully driven by Robot Automated Processing.

Silver - UK Customer Experience Awards - Best Customer Centric Culture - 2018

Consistently placing our customers at the heart of what we do has seen Business Stream awarded Silver in Best Customer Centric Culture. We have developed actionable CX measurement with root cause analytics across all journeys, launched a customer quality framework and transformed our digital customer experience to improve our customer experience scores and service levels.

Gold - UK Customer Experience Awards - Best Business Change & Transformation - 2017

Business Stream has won this award in recognition of its ability to truly understand its customers’ needs and deliver a business change and transformation project that has helped satisfy these needs and deliver significant improvements to customer service levels.

Gold - UK Customer Experience Awards - Best Customer-Centric Culture - 2017

This award recognises Business Stream’s success in creating a customer centric culture. The introduction of multiple contact channels including the Business Stream app are just two examples of the types of initiatives that have been introduced to enhance the level of service it provides its customers.

Gold - UK Customer Experience Awards - Best Use of Insight & Feedback - 2017

Implementing innovative customer insight and feedback tools has helped Business Stream to truly understand its customers’ needs and sentiments in real time. This award recognises Business Stream’s commitment to investing in this area and the results it has delivered.

Silver - UK Customer Experience Awards - Best Utilities - 2017

Business Stream was awarded a silver medal for Best Utilities for demonstrating outstanding levels of customer experience within the industry. This award was won in partnership with Pathfinder and CapGemini.

Gold - Digital Experience Awards - Omni-Channel Experience - 2017

This award recognises Business Stream’s ability to provide customers with multiple contact channels so that they can interact with Business Stream at a time and place that best suits their needs. This award was entered in partnership with CapGemini.

Gold - Digital Experience Awards - Business Change & Transformation - 2017

Innovation is a key driver in helping Business Stream to consistently meet and exceed customer expectations and to stay one step ahead of its competitors. This award recognises Business Stream’s commitment to implementing change across the business to enhance the level of service delivered to customers.

ISO Registration – 2014

Our water and waste water solutions team were certified as registered to ISO standards. This means our customers can benefit from improved quality and an enriched service from our team of water experts.

DMA certificate - Direct Marketing Association Membership - 2014

Business Stream became a certified member of the DMA, having demonstrated compliance with their code of practice.

Internet Business Awards - Energy and Utilities Website of the Year – 2013

The innovation and results achieved from Business Stream’s new mobile responsive website was awarded with the title of ‘Energy and Utilities website of the year’. This award especially recognises the progress delivered in the business to business world.

CBI Growing Business Awards - Green Business of the Year – 2012

Business Stream was presented with this award for helping to make customers over £19 million in water efficiency savings. These savings came from efficiency health checks, aerated taps and other water saving devices which helped customers meet their carbon efficiency goals.

First Women Awards - Business Services – 2012

These awards specifically recognise the success of extraordinary women across British businesses. Johanna Dow, Business Stream’s CEO, played a key role throughout the opening of the Scottish Water market in 2008 and has continued to lead and grow the business since market opening.

Regional Chamber Awards - Excellence in People Development – 2011

This award was given to Business Stream for demonstrating excellence in its approach to workforce development. Almost 900 training days were delivered in 2011 to its employees, equating to 4.5 training days per employee. Business Stream believes giving its staff the right skills to succeed is vital to delivering an excellent service to all customers.

CBI Growing Business Awards - People and Performance - 2009

After successfully devising and implementing modern people and process management practices to transform performance, Business Stream won this award. Employees are continually offered a breadth of training and development programmes as well as excellent pay and bonus structure.