Severn Trent Water faces serious charges
September 30, 2008
After being found guilty of involvement in the biggest overcharging scandal in Britain one of the country’s major water suppliers, Severn Trent Water, is facing serious fraud charges. The Midlands based water company could face serious penalties and charges from the Serious Fraud Office, and SFO officials could throw the book at a number of directors from Severn Trent Water. One of those that will have to face the music is Labour friend and former chairman Sir David Arculus, who was the president of the Confederation of British Industry, but had to give this up as a result of the scandal.
Severn Trent Water has been accused to deliberately providing misleading information to regulators in order to justify higher charges that were being made to customers. The scandal came to light after the whistle was blown by a company insider. The company was fined over £40 million last year for providing misleading information to the water regulator Ofwat, and had to issue refunds to millions of households.
Complaints relating to water bills have increased dramatically recently according to recent reports, and a variety of suppliers have had complaints lodged against them with regards to billing.
One industry professional stated: ‘We have a right as consumers to expect high quality customer service - even though water companies are monopolies and therefore most consumers have absolutely no choice over their supplier.’
Severn Trent Water is facing three charges with regards to providing misleading information in order to charge customers more, but a number of other water suppliers have faced action recently. Total fines of £32 million were imposed on Thames Water and Southern Water recently, also in relation to providing misleading information to Ofwat.
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