Consultation outcome

Consultation response: Water industry enforcement levy

Updated 19 August 2025

This is the Environment Agency’s water industry enforcement levy consultation response. It includes a summary of feedback received and confirms the outcome of the consultation.

Introduction

The water industry is fundamental to the health of our country – supporting people, wildlife, economic growth, and the environment. That is why it’s critical that water companies deliver on their environmental commitments. And it’s our role to make sure they do.

We launched our public consultation in April 2025 asking you to share your views on the proposed water industry enforcement levy. The Water (Special Measures) Act 2025 (WSMA) has enabled us to directly recover costs associated with our regulatory enforcement activity of the water industry. Historically, we have only had powers to recover costs linked to permit compliance. Due to a lack of legal powers to charge the water industry, enforcement costs associated with both permitted and unpermitted assets have been funded by government. The proposed water industry enforcement levy will only impact the water industry; it will not impact other sectors.

We have modernised and expanded our approach to regulation to address continued poor performance from the water industry. This included adding over 400 new specialised staff last year to carry out a significant increase in inspections of permitted activities. As we complete more inspections we expect to find more issues, leading to increased enforcement action.

We have designed the proposed levy to fully recover the costs, upfront, of providing sustainable and consistent enforcement under our enforcement and sanctions policy. This will support our wider water industry regulatory work and help drive better performance from water companies. Where we can already recover costs reactively from parties found liable, such as through a successful prosecution, we may continue to do so. For example, by claiming additional costs in court for work not covered by the proposed levy.

The consultation proposed the introduction of a levy based on those who hold permitted discharges with references 2.3.81 to 2.3.93 of the environmental permitting subsistence charge tables in The Environment Agency (Environmental Permitting and Abstraction Licensing) (England) Charging Scheme 2022. We proposed using unit charges based on the number, type, and volume of permitted discharges operated by each sewerage undertaker to calculate the total annual levy due.

For the purposes of the proposed levy, the water industry is defined as the ‘sewerage undertaker’. We use this term to refer specifically to statutory undertakers for sewerage who operate the public sewerage system, holding appointments as sewerage undertakers under the Water Industry Act 1991. The proposed levy will also apply to new appointments and variations (NAVs) appointed by Ofwat that provide sewerage services, if they hold relevant permits with the Environment Agency.

Outcome

We conducted a thorough review of all comments we received and considered whether it may be appropriate to make changes to our original proposals. The comments helped us understand any concerns or issues relating to our proposals. It was also valuable to hear from those who expressed their support for the changes we proposed.

As an outcome of the consultation process, we will apply a 40% reduction to the total levy charged to water companies for 2025 to 2026. This corresponds with the period during which we are transitioning to our full enforcement operating model, and the reduction makes sure the levy aligns with our expected costs for this financial year. From 1 April 2026, we will seek to recover our full yearly costs through the proposed levy.

After careful consideration, in all other respects we will be progressing as outlined in the consultation document. A summary of feedback we received and our response to the main key points is set out in the following sections.

How we ran the consultation

The consultation ran for 6 weeks from 14 April 2025 to 26 May 2025. It was available on our online consultations tool (Citizen Space) via GOV.UK. It was open to anybody to take part. Those who preferred to respond by email or post were able to request a copy of the consultation document and response form instead of responding online.

We ran the consultation in line with our legal requirements to consult, whilst following the Cabinet Office’s consultation principles guidelines. We notified ministers of our intention to consult.

It was important for us to give our customers the opportunity to understand the proposals and the impact they will have. We encouraged our customers to share their views through the consultation and publicised it openly.

Leading in to the consultation, our staff engaged with key stakeholders. For sewerage undertakers – the customers that would be affected by the changes – we arranged bespoke briefing packs outlining how the proposal would impact them individually. We also engaged directly with Water UK, the economic water regulator (Ofwat), Consumer Council for Water, and several environmental non-government organisations.

Overview of consultation responses

In total, we received 48 responses to this consultation. Of these, 45 responses adhered to the question format set out in our consultation, including:

• 40 through our online consultation tool (Citizen Space)
• 5 using our consultation response form

We also received 3 responses by email or letter. These are not included in the numerical summaries of consultation responses because they do not align with our question format. However, we have considered the themes identified in these responses alongside those received online or on a response form.

The 45 responses adhering to our consultation question format were submitted by:

• 14 organisations or businesses
• 30 individuals
• 1 did not answer

In annex 1 you can find numerical information about the responses to all consultation questions and a summary of the themes we identified in the consultation feedback.

Annex 2 gives a list of organisations and groups that participated in the consultation. These organisations represent private, community, and commercial interests.

We contacted all customers likely to be affected and 71% responded, including 100% of major water and sewerage companies. Therefore, we are confident all affected stakeholders have had the opportunity to respond to the consultation and provide valuable feedback.

We would like to thank all those who participated in the consultation and took time to provide this valuable feedback.

Consultation feedback and our response

The following sections summarise feedback relating to the main themes identified in consultation responses. We include our response under each of the main themes.

Most of the feedback related to how the charge affects customers and the charge scheme design.

These are the main themes we identified in responses to this consultation:

• how the charge affects customers
• charge scheme design and alternative solutions
• supports or partially supports proposals
• design of the consultation
• service we provide

We also address some individual points under the miscellaneous feedback section which relate to the following themes identified less often in consultation responses:

• how we manage charges
• protect the environment

How the proposed levy affects customers – feedback

We received responses from water companies and others explaining that the introduction of a new levy would cause a downstream impact on customers’ bills and disproportionately impact poorer households. It was highlighted that cost and revenue allowances are set by Ofwat through the periodic price review process, which ultimately determines customer bills. Respondents said the proposed cost of the levy was not budgeted for in water company AMP8 business plans and that cumulative customer impacts from the recent cost-of-service charges consultation had not been considered. These are some examples of the comments shared by respondents:

At the end of the day this will be paid by water companies’ customers in the form of higher bills. We already pay enough taxes to fund the EA.

We need earlier sight of any further cost increases as early as possible to allow appropriate budgeting and or funding.

EA suggest that reviews will increase and we have already seen some of this. This will have a significant impact on cost and resource.

How the proposed levy affects customers – our response

We acknowledge the proposed levy is an additional cost to water companies, and any new cost puts financial pressure on them. However, our consultation was launched to address the scale of offending and meet the public’s demand for an improved water environment at a time when we need to reduce our reliance on government funding.

The government carefully considered potential impacts when developing the Water (Special Measures) Act 2025 (WMSA).This included expanding charging powers to recover costs associated with our enforcement functions in relation to water company activities. An Impact Assessment for the Water (Special Measures) Bill was published on 25th October 2024. The Regulatory Policy Committee issued a green fit-for-purpose rating on the impact assessment on 13 November 2024. In addition, when we develop our proposals and activity requirements, efficiency savings and cost analysis is scrutinised internally, and then by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) and HM Treasury. The consultation provides a further opportunity for scrutiny of our proposals.

Our affordability assessment focussed specifically on the likely impacts to water companies using different metrics including annual revenue, operating costs, operating profit, cash generated from operations, and revenue from households. Whilst we concluded the impact to companies would be minimal, we acknowledged the high debt-to-equity ratio may make it difficult for companies to absorb additional costs from the proposed levy. However, processes relating to changes in costs are internal business decisions that each company will perform differently depending on a complex range of other factors they must consider, such as the number of permits a company holds for different activities, and the level of operating profit the business is running with.

We acknowledge that the proposed levy and increases to annual permit charges from our recent cost-of-service charge increases was not budgeted for in water company AMP8 business plans. Our cost recovery power only allows us to recover costs from water companies and does not mandate these costs are passed directly onto customer bills. All water and sewerage companies may consider engaging with Ofwat, to explore if costs that were unknown at the time of price controls being set could be addressed in line with Ofwat processes and guidance. Fines or penalties resulting from enforcement action are separate from the levy and, under current Ofwat guidance, are not to be pass on to customers. 

Responses did not provide sufficient additional information in feedback to alter our analysis and conclusions.

Between 2025 and 2030, the water industry is set to make investment to support long-term environmental improvements, with substantial funding already allocated through Ofwat’s price review process. In comparison to this wider investment context, the costs arising from increased environmental scrutiny and regulation are relatively small.

Charge scheme design and alternative solutions – feedback

Respondents wanted greater clarity for the rationale of charging upfront using permitted activities undertaken by sewerage undertakers only. They commented that the design did not consider performance, suggested alternative charges or methods of implementation, and questioned whether the proposal aligned with the polluter pays principle. We also received positive feedback for basing the charge on number and volume of permits. These are some examples of the comments we received: 

This seems to unfairly target water companies to fund general EA activities rather than tackling all sources of pollution.

It feels illogical to base the enforcement levy on environmental permits as it does not reflect the enforcement activity required or delivered.

It combines number and volumetric factors for permitted discharges, which is good.

Round up the numbers to the nearest £100 for the discharge permit unit charge (£400) and the nearest £0.10 for the volume unit charge (0.60).

Introduce a phased implementation that allows for adjustment and planning.

Charge scheme design and alternative solutions – our response

Following the introduction of the WSMA we are now able to recover the full cost of exercising our water industry enforcement functions, including the cost of enforcing existing requirements. The government has chosen to focus the WSMA on the water industry. That includes an expanded cost recovery power.

The WSMA enables recovery of costs incurred in performing water industry enforcement functions by us. It defines water companies, and the meaning of water industry enforcement functions. Government introduced the WSMA to enable us to fulfil our role, for which we need to source the funding. We have designed a levy to meet this expectation, and it is therefore only payable by the water industry. We have provided further information on the specific water industry enforcement activities the proposed levy will fund in our response to feedback on the service we provide.

We welcome the feedback on alternative ways we could design or implement the proposed levy, and have adjusted the amount we seek to recover in 2025 to 2026. However, we are unable to accommodate further phasing in of the proposed levy because:

• grant-in-aid funding from government will no longer be provided to fund our water industry enforcement activity
• we cannot delay required increases in enforcement activity

We are aware that the levy approach is different to our other charges that the water industry is already familiar with, such as fixed annual permit charges or time and materials charges for unplanned or unusual regulatory work. This is to enable our enforcement funding to be better aligned with water industry policy goals. If we only recovered costs reactively, this would limit our ability to put in place a trained and skilled workforce to assess the scale of offending and address public demand for an improved water environment.

Our levy proposals are expected to follow HM Treasury managing public money guidance, ensuring transparency, value for money and accountability. We have calculated our total annual costs to be £20.9 million, reflecting a sustainable enforcement function. More detail on how these costs are calculated is provided in our response under ‘service we provide’. We are distributing the cost for the year across the water industry based on permitted activity and volume to ensure contributions are fair and broadly proportionate to the scale and complexity of each company’s network.

We are not able to round the proposed levy’s unit charge rates, as this could lead to our income being significantly different to the funding we need. The unit charge rates are calculated using the total number of permits for 2024 to 2025 and the minimum volume thresholds set out in those charge bands. Discharge and volume units have been weighted roughly equally to meet overall funding needs. As a result, the proposed levy’s unit charge rates reflect the total enforcement we expect to deliver.

We acknowledge that the design of the proposed levy applies the polluter pays principle at a sector level, meaning that the entire water industry collectively contributes to the costs of our enforcement rather than only charging individual non-compliant water companies after a breach occurs. This charging approach recognises the potential enforcement risk is systemic and there may be widespread and serious non-compliances.

All water companies should benefit from a well-regulated and environmentally responsible industry. We believe proactive funding of our enforcement capacity enables us to act swiftly, consistently, and effectively. This, in turn, supports public confidence and expectations, as well as strengthening stable investment in companies that are governed by consistent regulation. We are optimistic that our regulation will also help maintain sector-wide standards by encouraging the sharing of initiatives, lessons, and technologies. Consistent enforcement also discourages operators from disproportionately prioritising other business objectives at the expense of environmental requirements, improving the industry’s overall reputation.

We have sought to make the model fairer and more proportionate by designing the total annual cost to a company on certain criteria rather than applying the same total charge to everyone. We believe our proposal is a balanced approach, accounting for differences in the scale and complexity of infrastructure operated by each company, alongside direct cost recovery from non-compliant companies using existing mechanisms, such as through the courts.

Consultation responses did not provide sufficient information on alternative solutions to facilitate the upfront funding we need, or to distribute that funding need across the water industry. As we build our understanding of the scale of offending in the sector, we will review all available intelligence and consider moving to a performance-based mechanism.

Supports and partially supports proposals – feedback

Feedback from respondents indicated they supported the move to reduce our reliance on government funding. Those that partially supported our proposal were typically water companies who agreed we should be resourced to carry out enforcement, but questioned the timing and their ability to budget for the change. These are some examples of the comments we received: 

By directly recovering the costs of enforcement, the Environment Agency will be able to better enforce the legislation without the cost burden falling on the taxpayer.

This levy is long overdue as in recent years the water industry has abused the loophole in the regulation for too long.

Whilst we don’t disagree with the fact that the EA need the correct resource and funding to fulfil its role, we have an issue with both the timing and transparency of the increases.

Supports and partially supports proposals – our response

We appreciate the positive feedback provided by respondents. Our response to timing and budgeting is addressed in our response to feedback on the design of the consultation. Specific issues were raised about our broader approach to enforcement, which fall outside of the direct scope of this consultation. We have shared these with our policy team to help inform future discussions.

Design of the consultation – feedback

Customers from the water industry sector expressed concern about timescales, noting proposals were put forward within the financial year and after final determinations of their business plans by Ofwat. They said this did not give them enough time to adjust their budgets and business plans. Some commented that the consultation did not provide the information they required to make a fully informed response. Further comments from the water industry sector suggested there was a lack of engagement with the water industry on the funding model and upcoming consultation. These are some examples of the comments we received: 

Water companies have just received their Final Determinations from Ofwat which has allocated their budget allowances, it is not appropriate to introduce multiple ad-hoc and unplanned increased on budgets.

It is not possible to assess the appropriateness of this levy, as the Agency have not provided any information on how the funding will be spent or how costings have been developed.

Engage in structured dialogue with the industry to co-design a fairer, more targeted enforcement funding model.

Design of the consultation – our response

The timing of our consultation on a water industry enforcement levy is a direct and reactive result of new powers given by the government for us to recover our enforcement costs directly from the water industry, reducing our reliance on government funding. For some time, water companies have been underperforming with regards to their environmental measures, as has been covered in the media and by environmental non-governmental organisations.

We understand the pressure this will put on companies. However, we need to respond to demands for better regulation of the water industry and recover the full cost of doing so. 

We acknowledge there will be a pressure for water and sewerage companies to react to charge increases for AMP8 (2025 to 2030). We carried out engagement as early as possible in the lead up to this consultation to support water and sewerage companies, ensuring they were given as much notice as possible. We do understand this concern, but it is necessary for us to introduce the proposed levy as soon as possible to fund the necessary regulatory transformation.

We welcome feedback from the water industry to help shape our future enforcement funding models. We are open to working with the sector on future changes to our cost recovery approach, so it continues to be fit for purpose and fair. Any future review of the levy will be subject to our need to make sure that funding remains aligned with the actual cost of delivering the service after identifying efficiencies and exploring opportunities to improve the service. Cost pressures and timing may be outside of our direct control, for example where government impose new duties that we need to respond to, or where the overall costs of employing our staff increase.

Service we provide – feedback

The feedback highlights concerns about how service improvements will be measured, a lack of transparency in calculating the unit charges and the requirement for approximately £21 million as quoted in our consultation. Respondents felt that greater clarity was needed on cost breakdowns, including existing funding sources, outstanding expenses, and the specific scope of the proposed levy. Additionally, some respondents wanted more information about the efficiencies we mentioned in the consultation. These are some examples of the comments we received: 

To what extent will an improvement in service etc be evidenced as a result of these proposals.

Secondly, there is a lack of transparency about the build-up of the £21 million required between 2025 to 2026, and unclear how the £393 charge and £0.51 per unit has been calculated.

We would also welcome further transparency on the costs of the activities, what are already funded by other costs of service mechanisms, what remains outstanding, and what the proposed levy is intended to cover in terms of existing enforcement activities.

Moreover the consultation indicates that ’where possible we have made efficiencies’ but no detail on this has been provided.

Service we provide – our response

We understand respondents would welcome more information on the activities funded by different charges, how we calculated our costs, and how we will track enforcement and monitor environmental outcomes of activities funded by the proposed levy.

We are committed, where possible, to recovering our full regulatory costs directly from the those we regulate, and to reduce our reliance on government funding. 

We have followed HM Treasury’s managing public money and classification of receipts guidance when calculating the costs of our regulatory services and setting our charges. Our charging scheme design was also subject to scrutiny from Defra and HM Treasury.

We can only propose and use charges in line with our legal powers. We cannot use existing sources of income such as annual permit charges to fund our water industry enforcement. Annual subsistence fees are designed to cover the costs of regulating a permitted activity. This includes our routine and expected tasks to make sure an operator is complying with the conditions in their permit or to support their return to compliance. The proposed levy covers enforcement activity in response to offences committed by a water company, such as permit breaches or pollution incidents, which goes beyond routine permit compliance. The proposed levy will be used to pursue punitive measures, such as criminal or civil sanctions under our enforcement and sanctions policy. Through our usual technical and management liaison routes, we have provided sewerage undertakers with a more detailed explanation of the activities covered by different charges. 

Where we can already recover costs for enforcement work, we may continue to do so for any additional effort, beyond that calculated in the proposed levy, by using existing cost recovery tools such as court cost schedules. For example, external costs we may incur such as expert witnesses, legal counsel, and law firms.

The circumstances where we may do this will be set out in guidance. We will only ever charge an operator once for any costs we incur.

With regards to transparency on how our costs are calculated, we provided a guide with the consultation to explain how the Environment Agency calculates its charges. This guide included evidence about how the total cost of the enforcement is calculated. It also included a summary of the types of costs making up our charges.

As noted in this guide, a charge is made up of both direct and indirect costs. We may provide a direct function locally (for example an officer in the field investigating) or nationally (for example assessing intelligence data to enable a risk-based approach to target high risk or high impact offending, or to undertake a sector wide investigation).

The direct cost therefore varies depending on the type of service and how it is provided.

Indirect functions exist to support the whole Environment Agency business and cannot easily be allocated directly back to specific sources of income, for example our health and safety, internal audit and estates teams. Their costs are distributed across all of our charging schemes and government grants. Charge payers contribute a proportionate share of these costs.

We also incur ‘capital financing costs’ for specific assets used exclusively by the water industry regime, and a proportion of corporate assets, for example IT systems and buildings. Our proposed levy charges also include our costs incurred where unpaid levy bills are no longer considered to be collectable, known as ‘bad debt’.

Based on the final proposal, our estimated costs for the proposed enforcement levy are given below in Table 1. These costs are assumed over a 12-month period.

Table 1: Summary of Environment Agency’s proposed annual water industry enforcement levy costs

Category	Amount (£million)
Direct costs	14.65
Indirect costs	5.66
Capital financing costs	0.46
Bad debt	0.17
Total	20.93

In line with HM Treasury guidance, we based our approach on seeking full cost recovery after identifying efficiencies and exploring opportunities to improve the service we offer. We continually look for ways to make our services more efficient and better value for money. However, we cannot fund the transformation in water quality regulation that our customers and government now expect without introducing a levy to fund our enforcement.

We have incorporated efficiencies into our charge design by using permits and volume as the metric for levy payments. This reduces administration costs, as we already hold this data, whilst raising the required income. It also provides an efficiency for us and our customers by avoiding the need for introducing new or excessive processing costs, whilst raising sufficient, sustainable funding for enforcement activity. 

In addition, the proposed levy will enable us to fund continuous improvements to our enforcement tools, techniques, and delivery model, as well as supporting research, development and evaluation projects. This will help us ensure that our enforcement interventions are effective and efficient in driving an improvement in water company performance.

Miscellaneous – feedback

Some additional points were raised in relation to how we manage charges and protect the environment. We will address these here.

Respondents asked about reassurance on not cross-subsidising other sectors, and lack of clarity around how the proposed levy fits in with wider water environment policies and strategies. There were concerns that the levy could divert money from environmental investment. These are some examples of the comments we received: 

What assurances are there that the water industry levy isn’t cross-subsidising other sectors?

The proposals show no sign of an overall strategy for EA funding to deliver compliance with the requirements of the Water Framework Directive Regulations or whatever succeeds them.

This will be an environmental impact as funding will be diverted from investments to improve the environment and maintaining our asset base, towards paying these charges.

Miscellaneous – our response

We understand that customers want reassurance that the proposed levy will be used for its intended purpose, and we have a number of mechanisms to make sure that levy funding is used for this. We will provide clear guidance to budget holders and create dedicated teams such as our newly established water industry regulation teams, and our water industry enforcement teams.

We are focussed on identifying the root causes of environmental harm. Our enforcement work is underpinned by the objective to embed a more proactive, preventative and intelligence led approach to the water industry, helping improve company performance and reducing offending across the regulatory cycle. 

We are building our enforcement capacity and capability to help transform how the water industry is regulated. The Environmental Improvement Plan of 2023, sets out a goal of achieving ‘clean and plentiful water’, with a number of work areas identified as key contributors, including the need to improve wastewater infrastructure and the environmental performance of water companies.

Our goal is to hold the water industry to account by:

• making their performance more visible through better transparency and scrutiny
• preventing issues before they arise through smarter planning
• taking action when things do go wrong

Since 2023, and following the 2024 increase in EPR water quality charges, we have:

• more than tripled inspections from 1,409 for 2023 to 2024, to over 4,650 for 2024 to 2025
• set ambitious targets to reach 10,000 inspections a year by March 2026 and 11,500 by March 2027
• recruited hundreds of new officers, increasing our presence on the ground
• improved how we use data and technology to prioritise the most serious environmental offences

As we carry out more water company inspections, we are finding more non-compliances that need enforcement action. This is why we need to grow our enforcement capability and capacity, which we have proposed to fund through the water industry enforcement levy. 

As outlined in our response to feedback about how the proposed levy affects customers, it is a matter for individual companies to decide the extent to which they can absorb additional costs. With regard to feedback that funding the proposed levy would divert money from environmental investments, we recognise the concern. However, in practice, environmental improvements are included in the water industry national environment programme (WINEP) and must be delivered by a due date. The proposed enforcement levy does not detract from environmental obligations that must still be delivered, and it will enable us to better hold water companies to account where failing to meet those commitments.

Next steps

We have considered all consultation feedback and assessed whether we need to make changes to our proposals.

We have now published the updated charging scheme on GOV.UK.

Also available is our guide to how the Environment Agency calculate its charges.

Annex 1: Numerical summary of consultation responses

This annex sets out the responses we received to our consultation on the proposed water industry enforcement levy.

We received 45 responses through the online tool and consultation response form. We also received 3 emails or letters with comments relating to the consultation.

About you  

Within the online tool and response form, we included an ‘about you’ section to provide us with an understanding of who responded and to help us better analyse the consultation feedback.

We asked if consultees were giving a personal response as an individual or providing their response on behalf of an organisation. The 45 responses (40 online and 5 using our consultation response form), stated:

• responding as an individual – 30
• responding on behalf of an organisation, group or trade association – 14
• other – 0
• not answered – 1

Consultation questions

Questions are set out in the same format as they were presented in the online consultation tool and response form. Multiple-choice questions gave respondents the option to select one response. These were followed by a free text box for comments.

For each question, we report all the multiple-choice option responses. These are followed by a list of key points identified most frequently in the free text comments.

Themes are given in descending order with the most frequently identified first.

Question 1: To what extent do you agree or disagree with the proposed water industry enforcement levy?

This question received more positive (22) responses than negative (16) responses:

• strongly agree – 11
• agree – 11
• neither agree nor disagree – 5
• disagree – 9
• strongly disagree – 7
• do not know – 1
• not applicable – 0
• did not answer – 1

Comments were submitted by 42 respondents to the consultation (93%). The following themes were identified more than 15 times:

• ‘charge scheme design’ (25)
• ‘supports or partially supports proposal’ (18)
• ‘how charge affects customers’ (17)

The following themes were identified less often:

• ‘how we manage charges’
• ‘service we provide’
• ‘protect environment’
• ’design of the consultation’
• ‘alternative suggestions’

Two comments were not charge related and 3 respondents left no comment. Any issues relating to specific teams or departments have been flagged to the relevant managers.

Question 2: To what extent do you agree or disagree with our view on affordability and impacts?

This question received more negative (20) responses than positive (12) responses:

• strongly agree – 3
• agree – 9
• neither agree nor disagree – 9
• disagree – 13
• strongly disagree – 7
• do not know – 2
• not applicable – 0
• did not answer – 2

Comments were submitted by 42 respondents to the consultation (93%). The following themes were identified more than 10 times:

• ‘how charge affects customers’ (29)
• ‘charge scheme design’ (12)
• ‘supports or partially supports proposal’ (10)

The following themes were identified less often:

• ‘design of the consultation’
• ‘alternative suggestion’
• ‘protect environment’
• ‘service we provide’

Two comments were not charge related and 3 respondents left no comment. Any issues relating to specific teams or departments have been flagged to the relevant managers.

Letter and email responses

We analysed the comments in the 3 responses submitted by letter or email. These responses did not align with our consultation question format. The main themes identified were: 

• ‘how charge affects customers’ (3)
• ‘charge scheme design’ (3)
• ‘service we provide’ (2)
• ‘design of the consultation’ (2)
• ‘alternative suggestions’ (2)

The following themes were mentioned less often:

• ‘how we manage charges’
• ‘protect environment’
• ‘supports or partially supports proposal’

Any issues relating to specific teams or departments have been flagged to the relevant managers.

Annex 2: List of consultation participants

The following businesses or organisations responded to this consultation:

• Acorn Water
• Anglian Water
• Blueprint for Water
• Consumer Council for Water (CCW)
• JBA Consulting
• Northumbrian Water
• Severn Trent Water
• South Staffs Water
• South West Water
• Southern Water
• Thames Water
• United Utilities
• Walterstones UK Ltd
• Water UK
• Welsh Water (Dŵr Cymru)
• Wessex Water
• Worshipful Company of Water Conservators
• Yorkshire Water Services Limited

The number of respondents in the consultation who said they were an organisation or business may differ from the number of organisations named in this list. This is because some respondents stated they were a business but did not include their business name or organisation, or they did complete the question to allow their response to be published.