Utility Week

UTILITY WEEK | FEBRUARY 2022 | 31 Vulnerable customers in the longer-term vulnerability cohort, and those who were temporarily struggling. The rationale for this was to explain to those in the second group that taking a payment holi- day may not be in their best interests, in that they would be building up debt for later. "People in these circumstances don't need a payment holiday but rather a week or two's grace until they get paid again. They are not used to being in debt so therefore they feel they are in crisis. They just need a bit of payment leniency, and we are trying to empower agents to suggest these types of alternatives without upsetting anyone. "Some of our agents are able to do it, but the training for that is still coming on line. And understanding how we empower peo- ple to have those conversations is the biggest challenge we are facing at the moment." There was broad agreement that serving the just about managing (JAM) customers is going to become increasingly challenging. The impact of Covid and rising living costs are putting a strain on more households and pushing more into a situation where it is hard to make ends meet. In terms of mitigating these risks and helping customers, a number of diƒ erent things were raised. First, the di… culty of quantifying the problem. This is because most will continue to pay their bills and go without other things until they encounter insurmountable di… - culties. Pensioners were a prime example. One energy supplier representative said there would be more JAMs as people came out of contract for cheaper ˆ xed price deals and rolled onto more expensive stand- ard variable tariƒ s. What exacerbated the problem was that the normal procedure for engaging with these customers was di… - cult for smaller suppliers, who did not have the resources to cope with the increased numbers. The conversation also threw up the dif- ˆ culty of understanding the right channels through which to communicate with diƒ er- ent JAM groups. Again, pensioners were sin- gled out as being especially tricky because of their aversion to digital options. Discussion also turned to the diƒ erent payment processes and it was agreed that it was easier to spot signs of ˆ nances being out of kilter for receipt billpayers than those on direct debit. It may be a case of those who are prone to paying a day or two late may start to pay a week or so late. These were the signals that utility companies need to have on their radar, but there appeared to be very little sign of this happening in an automated fashion. Denise Chevin, freelance journalist in association with In association with In this report Introduction The urgent need to level up Why COVID is driving the need to change Emerging vulnerable cohorts Helping people help themselves The need for more self-serve and better trained agents Identifying and supporting the 'just about managing' Data sharing is key New ideas needed for the long-term vulnerable The new ideas utilities are harnessing Data sharing with the DWP How it could work and benefit bill payers and utilities Concluding remarks Levelling up: what now? V I E W P O I N T Data-led decisions in solving debt From Inawisdom's Russ Voden I N S I G H T R E P O R T Levelling up debt journeys for vulnerable customers Rising living costs and the fallout from the pandemic is exercising utilities as they set about developing diversified approaches to dealing with different cohorts of customers in financial difficulty. In this Utility Week Insight report we asked experts from water and energy to share their experiences and solutions. Download the report Download the report Levelling up debt journeys for vulnerable customers free at: https://utilityweek.co.uk/ levelling-up-debt-journeys-for-vulnerable-customers/

• Cover