Leaking cash: Thames Water notched up £50m in penalties last year and swung to loss
Thames Water notched up penalties of around £50m last year as the business performed poorly on customer experience and flooded sewers.
The utility company said it had been handed £51.9 m penalties, while only getting rewards of £3.27m.
Water companies that have monopolies in their local area, such as Thames Water, are given rewards or penalties based on their performance, under criteria agreed with regulator Ofwat.
Thames Water said it had met 26 of the 49 performance commitments that were assessed this year.
In an update to shareholders the utility company said it swung to a £198.5m after-tax loss, from a £244.6m profit the year before.
Revenue dipped from £2.2bn to £2.1bn.
Thames Water has set targets for the five years to 2025, but it said today it’s has fallen behind on meeting them.
“Through the business planning process, we were set very challenging targets for some of our performance commitments and we put plans together to make headway towards our goals. However, we’re behind where we planned to be at the end of year one and we know that’s unacceptable,” it said.