Thames Water finds 4,000 unread customer emails

Water company pays out £60,000 compensation to customers

Thames Water has paid out £60,000 compensation to customers

Following the discovery of a customer feedback email address containing nearly 4,000 unread customer emails from 2003, utilities company Thames Water has paid out £60,000 in compensation to affected customers.

Industry regulator Ofwat revealed details of the incident in its latest report released today and said it had been made aware of the blunder in March this year.

A Thames Water spokesperson said that the unread messages were sent to an email address starting "customerfeedback" rather than the correct " customer.feedback".

The 1,800 mails were discovered when a member of staff sent an email to the wrong “customerfeedback” address and realised something was wrong when they didn't get a reply. Thames Water then carried out an investigation and found the inbox.

“When we spotted this problem, we told the regulator Ofwat and began to make amends to all affected customers,” said a Thames Water spokesperson.

“We have paid out a total of £60,000 to compensate the 1,800 people we let down and we are currently investing a further £1.2m on further improving our customer feedback service.”

Of the 1,800 people who were compensated, 1,200 received £40 and 600 were given £20.

The water company has also proposed a package of measures to improve customer service, including enhanced online facilities, improved training for frontline customer service operatives and enhanced online facilities.

Ofwat said in its report: “The company’s approach to tackling this issue has been positive; it has taken action to address the root causes of the failure and has put measures into place to prevent it being repeated.

"It has also taken the opportunity to examine the wider implications for its customer service more generally and develop a better system.”