The following is the letter sent to Wessex Water from a customer informing them why she is withholding payment.
Dear Billing Team at Wessex Water
I have intentionally withheld payment for my 2023-2024 water services bill because of your poor performance in managing the sewerage system. You have been dumping sewage into our waterways, and neglecting to upgrade infrastructure whilst making huge profits from customers, profits used to pay shareholder dividends.
Wessex Water is not alone in this shameful performance and customer scam.
Across England there were over 301,000 sewage discharges last year amounting to more than 1.75 million hours of discharge, according to the Environment Agency. That’s 824 incidents per day.
A shocking 75% of UK rivers pose a serious risk to human health, and the health of our oceans and rivers has never been worse.
When I look at published data for Wessex Water, your record reflects the poor national situation.
The annual number of serious pollution incidents from Wessex Water has increased year on year since 2019. In 2021, there were a total of 23,524 sewage discharges by Wessex Water, over a duration of 151,258 hours.
You were 1 of 6 water companies to be poorly rated ‘red’ by the Environmental Agency in the 2021 Environmental Performance Rating, for serious pollution incidents. In 2022, the 55 sewage dumps into Poole Harbour, lasting 257 hours will also have harmed the marine and land wildlife in this special conservation area. I rate you as highly irresponsible.
In the financial year ending March 2022, over £60 million was paid out in shareholder dividends and your CEO’s pay and bonuses amounted to almost £1 million.
So you can see my reluctance to pay money for you to squander.
Until now I have always paid my bill on time, and believed that was the right thing to do. However, you are not doing the right thing for customers and our health, for our waterways, for our wider environment and wildlife, and our planet at large. Therefore, you are not upholding your end of the deal.
I am amongst a growing number of people across the Wessex Water area, and indeed across the country, who are fed up and angry with your treatment of the waterways. As a coastal dweller and sea-lover it is distressing to know you dump sewage into Weymouth Bay and other Dorset waterways.
Frankly, do you want to swim in water with turds and tampons floating past your nose? Maybe CEO Chris Skellett would like to join us for a swim, to test his tolerance for dirty water.
As I am now pursued by a private debt collector threatening a visit to my home, I have today paid you £161.95. This is half the amount for the annual bill covering ONLY water supply charges. At this time I am UNWILLING to pay any contribution to the sewerage charges, because you have proven you are not competent to manage sewage safely.
As a customer and now a campaigner for clean water, I demand no shareholder pay-outs unless you comply with environmental regulations, and cut the crap from our coastal and inland waterways.
Yours sincerely
Caz Dennett
Weymouth, Dorset
Is this the only way these private companies will listen?
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