Energy prices: Gap between best and worst firms widens

Energy prices

Eighty times more customers complain about Extra Energy than top company SSE, says Citizens Advice league table. The gap between the UK’s best and worst energy providers is getting wider… Releasing its latest league table on energy companies’ performances, the group found the worst firms are getting worse – and receiving more complaints.

Small energy provider Extra Energy attracted 80 times more complaints proportionally than the firm that topped the table, SSE.

Extra Energy’s 1,791 complaints per 100,000 customers between April and June was an increase on the previous quarter’s 1,682. In the same period, SSE improved its performance with only 22 complaints per 100,000.

The second and third worst companies, Co-Operative Energy and Scottish Power, also increased their complaints ratio.

Co-Operative had 850 complaints per 100,000 customers, an increase on 819, while Scottish Power had 571, up from 558.

At the opposite end of the table, other companies that performed well include EDF, British Gas and E.On.

Gillian Guy, of Citizen’s Advice, told the BBC: “The latest league table shows some suppliers are getting much better at sorting out their customers’ problems, but it’s disappointing to see others getting worse at dealing with complaints.”

Extra Energy said it was improving its record and dealing with complaints more quickly.

“These figures reflect historic customer service issues that occurred during a period of time where Extra Energy saw our number of customers expand rapidly and unfortunately some of these complaints have taken longer than expected to resolve,” said a spokesman.

“We apologise unreservedly to anyone who has not received the standard of service we expect of ourselves.”