HOUSEHOLDS are facing “plummeting” customer service standards from their energy suppliers as they are being clobbered by soaring bills.
A growing number of families have been left unable to contact their supplier, left on hold for longer, and have been facing billing problems according to Citizens Advice.
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The charity has ranked the best and worst energy companies for customer service, between October and December 2021.
During this period, a number of high profile energy companies went bust, and families saw their bills soar as a cost of living crunch started to hit their budgets.
Citizens Advice said that energy suppliers’ customer service is now the worst it has been on average since 2017.
One of the main reasons why standards are dropping is due to a rise in call waiting times.
The average time households are spending waiting to get through to their energy supplier is more than five minutes (340 seconds) – up from around four minutes (246 seconds) in the previous year.
Customers with suppliers ranked at the bottom of Citizens Advice’s list face waits of around 15 minutes.
The charity has raised concerns that soaring waiting times could mean customers trying to get support to pay their bills from their supplier simply aren’t getting the help they need.
Citizens Advice chief executive Dame Clare Moriarty said the drop in standards “comes at the worst time possible” now that the price cap has increased.
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The price cap hike which happened on April 1 means the average household bill will reach £1,971 a year – doubling millions of families bills.
It means hard-up households are facing falling into debt because of the huge spike in costs.
Here’s exactly where your energy company ranks on Citizens Advice’s list.
Best and worst suppliers ranked
Citizens Advice has scored suppliers out of five on customer service categories including call wait times, how long it takes to get an email reply and accuracy of energy bills.
It ranked Utilita as the worst energy supplier at 1.7 out of five, and Boost Power second from the bottom at 1.88.
Ecotricity comes after at 2.1, and then Good Energy at 2.25.
Ovo Energy, meanwhile, also made the bottom five at 2.3.
M&S Energy and EDF both came top of the list with a score of 3.85, with Octopus Energy and Affect Energy joint second place at 3.75.
So Energy came in third at 3.7.
But high scores have dropped 12.5% since the previous year, when the best energy supplier was ranked 3.95 out of five.
Here’s where all the suppliers ranked from best to worst:
- M&S Energy: 3.85
- EDF Energy: 3.85
- Octopus Energy: 3.75
- Affect Energy: 3.75
- So Energy: 3.7
- Co-Operative Energy: 3.65
- Bulb: 3.3
- Utility Warehouse: 3.25
- E (Gas and Electricity): 3.13
- Shell Energy: 3.1
- Outfox The Market: 3.05
- E.ON Energy: 2.9
- Scottish Power: 2.9
- British Gas: 2.85
- SSE: 2.6
- Ovo Energy: 2.3
- Good Energy: 2.25
- Ecotricity: 2.1
- Boost Power: 1.88
- Utilita: 1.7
A Utilita spokesperson said: “As a company we really value the fact that the Citizens Advice energy star rating is performed every three months because we operate in a sector where change is constant.
“However, it is also worth acknowledging that the star rating does not fully represent what customers need from an energy supplier today.
“It does not take into account the financial support we provided on almost 200,000 occasions during the reporting period, nor the millions of households that our award-winning Energy High 5 campaign has helped to cut their energy usage.”
Boost Power, Ecotricity, Good Energy and Ovo Energy were contacted for commment.
How to complain about your energy company
If you have a complaint about your energy company, then you should take it to the Energy Ombudsman.
They handle issues between customers and suppliers.
If you’ve tried to resolve a problem with your provider and you’re getting nowhere, the Energy Ombudsman will look at your case and see if they can help you deal with the complaint.
It helps resolve issues on billing, installations and delays, loss of service, customer service, and switching suppliers.
If they help take your complaint on, they can only help back bill you for 12 months.
That means you won’t be able to get help getting money back before this.
Another energy supplier has launched a £5million hardship fund to help customers with their bills.
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