From 1 April Thames Water changed eligibility criteria for our social tariff to help those most impacted by the cost of-living crisis – younger, larger, families. We have made this change after piloting the new criteria for a year, working with stakeholders such as the Consumer Council for Water and listening to customers’ feedback. Rather than looking solely at income, we now compare customers’ water bills with their income and consider how many people live in the home.
We recognise the pressure on household finances and have increased the reach of our social tariff. We provided £69m of financial assistance through discount tariffs to 383,000 customers in the year 2023/2024, which is an additional 54,000 customers supported since 2022/2023. Our Extra Care team undertakes income and expenditure reviews with customers and identifies the best support we are able to provide, as well as making referrals for free debt advice to Pay Plan, and household income maximisation services from In Best’s benefit calculator to help customers save money. We expect to undertake over 50,000 reviews this year and could do more but require customers to engage with us so we can understand their circumstances. Those in debt often don’t know that we can help, which is why we would welcome your support to explain what help is available.
Our Priority Services Register (PSR) also supports households who need extra care – such as those with dementia, or who have mobility issues – with support including deliveries of bottled water to households during water supply interruptions; easier to read bills and extra security measures. I am pleased to let you know that we reached our regulatory target to grow our PSR 18 months early in October 2023. Our initial target for October 2023 was 320,000, a target we exceeded by 90,000 customers.
Our financial support programs include:
- WaterHelp, which provides 50% off bills for households whose bills are more than 5% of their net income, taking into account the number of occupants. This is the currently the largest support program of its kind in the utilities sector.
- WaterSure caps bills at £471 (2024/2025) for households with large families or water-dependent medical conditions.
If you would like to find out more about the help on offer, you can do so here.
