Customer psychology

Understanding the customers' relationship with distribution pressure

Reference: 16/CU/02/15
ISBN: 1 84057 810 6
Published Date: 21/09/2022

This report examines the understanding and expectations that customers have about water pressure and investigates those factors that influence the expectations. In particular it explores how customers are affected when water pressure is lower. It also reviews communication practices between water companies and customers around the issues of pressure, both in terms of short-term responses to problems that arise, and through longer-term planning and consultation initiatives, identifying aspects of good practice and clarifying the linkages between pressure management strategies and customer engagement strategies.

Price: £10  

Using Smart Meters to Deliver Savings for Consumers

Reference: 19/CU/02/16
ISBN: 978 1 84057 867 6
Published Date: 05/05/2019

Improving water efficiency is increasingly seen as an essential policy objective in the UK and Ireland, and governments and water companies are looking at a range of measures to deliver this. Water metering is commonly used as a tool to support efficiency programmes, and smart meters can provide information to customers which could potentially help further in encouraging water saving behaviours. This report examines the commercial and technical case for smart water metering, and the potential for joint energy / water approaches to support this and efficiency programmes more generally. It considers international and UK experience in relation to both energy / water efficiency and smart metering initiatives.

Price: £10  

How to Change Customer Behaviour to Encourage Greater Use of 'Self-Service' Facilities

Reference: 13/CU/02/14
ISBN: 1 84057 702 9
Published Date: 11/12/2013

As part of a growing emphasis on the quality of customer service, UK water companies are looking to increase the adoption of new technologies and self-service methods of interaction.

This report include a review of current practices of self-service migration from both the water industry and other sectors and identifies previously successful marketing strategies. These strategies were tested with water bill payers using a programme of qualitative and quantitative research and the results were used to produce guidance for water companies to consider when developing their own self-service strategies.

The industry guidance includes a segmentation analysis which profiles customer groups according to likelihood to adopt self-service and recommended migration strategies. The guidance also provides easy-to-apply advice on how to embed self-service into customer behaviour after the initial migration.

Price: £10