New research has revealed that utilities companies have the worst-performing call centres than any other industry.

Utility company call centres are the worst-performing industry call centres according to the Citizens Advice Bureau (CAB), which believes that far more than 55,000 extra people every year could be helped if such companies improved their customer service.

The national advice charity recently carried out an online survey and found that nearly one third of people spend longer than 30 minutes on the phone to their utility company, with many having to call more than once in order to resolve their issue.

CAB advisers, most of whom are volunteers, calculated that they would be able to help more than 55,000 extra people a year if they could make calls on behalf of clients that last no longer than ten minutes.

The survey also discovered that nine out of ten people were either ‘dissatisfied’ or ‘very dissatisfied’ with the way in which their last call was handled by their utility company. The majority of these calls were to BT and British Gas whose complaint numbers were significantly higher than each company’s market share, of 68% and 46% respectively.

“I would simply like to ask the Chief Executives of all the utility supply companies, and especially BT and British Gas, if they could investigate the issues in our report and make improvements,” explained David Harker, Chief Executive of CAB.

“Many companies say publicly that they support the work of the Citizens Advice service and one very simple way they could put that into practice and help us do our job is to improve the service they deliver to their customers on the frontline. Our advisers would prefer that the problems they are asked to help with just did not happen in the first place.”

To improve customer service, the CAB has recommended that companies ensure all up-to-date consumer satisfaction figures and cost information is readily available to their customers and potential customers.

More information about the CAB and its information and advisory service can be found by visiting the organisation’s website ^[1].