FOI request: Water complaints

Dear Naomi

Thank you for your request dated 2 April 2024, which I have treated as an application under the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2022 (FOISA) due to the nature of the information you requested.

FOISA gives everyone the right to ask Scottish public authorities for information they hold. However, section 8 of FOISA sets out what a request must include to be valid. If the request is invalid, the public authority is under no obligation to comply with the request. The Scottish Information Commissioner has no power to carry out an investigation into invalid requests or to order the authority to disclose information. Section 8(1)(b) states that the request must include the full name of the applicant to be valid.

If you would like to proceed with this request, I would be grateful if you could provide your full name. Once I receive this, I will be able to formally respond. You can continue to use the WhatDoTheyKnow website, email me directly [Business Stream request email] or write to Trevor Nelson, Business Stream, PO Box 17381, Edinburgh, EH12 1GT.
Useful information on how to submit a request can be found on the Scottish Information Commissioner website https://www.itspublicknowledge.info/how-...

I note that you are “attempting to find which areas have the most water complaints in the UK”. To assist with your request, I thought it might be beneficial to mention a couple of points.

Business Stream provides water and waste water services throughout England and Scotland to non-household customers. We are not a regional water company. Therefore, any information we provide will not give you insight at a regional level which is your stated aim.

You may also find that much of what you are seeking is available on CCW’s website https://www.ccw.org.uk/. As the independent representative for water consumers in England and Wales it collects and collates complaint data from the regional water companies with most of the data published on its website.

Yours sincerely

Trevor Nelson
Senior Regulation and Compliance Manager
Business Stream

show quoted sections

Thank you for your email dated 2 April 2024, requesting information
regarding complaints. On this occasion, I am treating this as a request
under the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 (FOISA).

You have asked three questions relating to complaints Business Stream
received in 2021, 2022, and 2023. I have repeated your questions below and
I have provided information against each one in turn.

I note that you are “attempting to find which areas have the most water
complaints in the UK”. As per our email of 3 April 2024, I thought it
might be beneficial to reiterate a couple of points regarding Business
Stream. Specifically, as a Retailer, Business Stream operates in the
English and Scottish non-household water markets to provide water and
waste water services to over 300,000 business customers. Our services
include meter reading, billing, customer service support and added value
services. We are not directly involved in the treatment, supply or
distribution of water and waste water.  As we are not a regional water
company, we are not able to provide you with any details at a regional
level, therefore the information I am providing covers both Scotland and
England.

1) How many water complaints did you receive in the years, 2021, 2022, and
2023?

April 21 to March 22:        2,659

April 22 to March 23:           971

April 23 to March 24:        2,359

I have provided the total number of written complaints from all
customers.  To provide context, we supply over 300,000 non-household
customers across the UK, so the proportion of complaints we receive is
comparatively low. The most recent Business Customer Complaints Report
published by CCW reports shows written complaints to Business Stream at 11
per 10,000 SPIDs (supply points) for the year-ended 2022/23 (source: CCW).

Normalised written complaints to larger retailers (written complaints per
10,000 SPIDs)

[1]A graph of a bar chart Description automatically generated with medium
confidence

Source: CCW, English (and Welsh) complaints

2) What are the reasons for the complaints?

 a. The quality of the water
 b. The water pressure
 c. Interruption to water supply
 d. Unhappy with service
 e. Water pipes
 f. Costs
 g. Damages
 h. Other, please specify

As a Retailer operating in the Anglo-Scottish non-household water markets,
Business Stream does not record complaints using these definitions. The
nature of complaints we receive from customers typically relate to the
services we provide, for example, billing and our responsiveness when
dealing with customer queries etc, with any complaints about the quality
and availability of water and wastewater services (where there is a
dependency on a regional water company) categorised as ‘wholesaler’
related. 

To provide the data in the categories requested would require a review of
each complaint. Due to the number of complaints over the requested
three-year period, the cost of this would exceed £600. As the cost of
complying with your request will be higher than the £600 upper-cost limit
set by the Freedom of Information (Fees for Required Disclosure)
(Scotland) Regulations 2004 we are not obliged to continue with your
enquiry.

However, to assist, I have provided our England and Wales complaints split
by the CCW categories, as per our reporting requirements. As CCW only
covers England and Wales, I am unable to provide a similar split for
Scottish complaints, although the proportions by category are likely to be
broadly similar.

┌──────────────────────────┬───────────────┬──────────────┬──────────────┐
│Breakdown by category │ April 2021 - │ April 2022 - │ April 2023 - │
│ │ │ │ │
│ │ March 2022 │ March 2023 │ March 2024 │
├──────────────────────────┼───────────────┼──────────────┼──────────────┤
│England, of which │ 1,334 │ 439 │ 1,028 │
├──────────────────────────┼───────────────┼──────────────┼──────────────┤
│Retailer │ 1,095 │ 271 │ 852 │
├──────────────────────────┼───────────────┼──────────────┼──────────────┤
│Other Retailer │ 41 │ 22 │ 21 │
├──────────────────────────┼───────────────┼──────────────┼──────────────┤
│Wholesaler │ 86 │ 67 │ 86 │
├──────────────────────────┼───────────────┼──────────────┼──────────────┤
│Mixed │ 112 │ 79 │ 69 │
├──────────────────────────┼───────────────┼──────────────┼──────────────┤
│Scotland (no breakdown) │ 1,325 │ 532 │ 1,331 │
├──────────────────────────┼───────────────┼──────────────┼──────────────┤
│Total Complaints │ 2,659 │ 971 │ 2,359 │
└──────────────────────────┴───────────────┴──────────────┴──────────────┘

3) How much have you had to pay out in connection with water complaints
during the years 2022, 2023, and 2024? In pounds (£).

April 2021 to March 2022:      £21,606

April 2022 to March 2023:     £13,730

April 2023 to March 2024:      £28,924

I trust that this information will be satisfactory to answer your
enquiries. For information provided under FOISA, you can appeal if you are
dissatisfied with the outcome. You must appeal within 40 working days
commencing on 13^th May 2024.  Upon receiving your request for a review of
this response, we will conduct an internal review which will be undertaken
by an independent team whose members were not involved in responding to
the initial request.  Business Stream is required to complete internal
reviews within 20 working days. Please address any such appeal to the
Senior Regulation and Compliance Manager in writing or by email. If you
are emailing can you please use the email [Business Stream request email]

If your request for information is not resolved to your satisfaction at
that stage, you can appeal further to the Scottish Information
Commissioner, the independent body that oversees the implementation of
FOISA [2]Appeal to the Commissioner | Scottish Information Commissioner
(itspublicknowledge.info)

Regards

Fiona Matheson | Regulation and Market Analyst 
1-3 Lochside Crescent, Edinburgh, EH12 9SE

Postal address: Business Stream, PO Box 17381, Edinburgh, EH12 1GT

IMPORTANT NOTICE: This email is confidential. If you are not the intended
recipient please notify us immediately by replying to this email, delete
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given nor endorsed by Business Stream.

Scottish Water Business Stream Limited trading as Business Stream.
Registered in Scotland with number: SC294924.

Registered office address and principal place of business: 1-3 Lochside
Crescent, Edinburgh, EH12 9SE VAT number: 945850885.

References

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2. https://www.itspublicknowledge.info/appeal