1 November 2006
British Gas has been forced to defend itself following the BBC Watchdog programme branding the company the most expensive fuel provider in Britain and berating it for providing the worst customer service.
The accusations resulted from the large number of complaints made about the gas supplier to the consumer group energywatch. A total of 15,433 complaints were made between April and September of this year, a figure which is more than double the amount received in the same period last year.
The majority of recorded complaints were regarding the lack of response to customer enquiries and inaccurate billing. British Gas says that it tries to answer phone calls within a minute, but researchers for Watchdog said that they had waited an average of nine minutes before their call was answered. In one instance, they were forced to wait for 47 minutes.
A British Gas spokesman has said the company was introducing a new billing system and training 10,000 frontline staff as part of a £400 million investment in customer services. He added that the customer service problems consumers were encountering now were a "temporary situation".
energywatch has since recommended that the regulatory body Ofgem look into the complaints. Mark Wiltsher, a spokesman for Ofgem, told the Guardian: "Customers should vote with their feet. If they aren't getting a good deal either on price or service, then the message is clear that they should switch suppliers."
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