OREANDA-NEWS. Dwr Cymru Welsh Water has today received its Final Determination from the industry regulator, Ofwat, on the company's Business Plan for 2015-20.

The Final Determination sets the price limit that Welsh Water can charge customers for their water and wastewater services between 2015 and 2020 and also the service targets that the company are expected to deliver. Every five years, water and wastewater bills are set by Ofwat based on Business Plans submitted by water companies across England and Wales. Welsh Water will now carefully consider the details of Ofwat's Final Determination. 

Welsh Water's Business Plan committed to keep average household bills at least 1% below inflation between 2015 and 2020 whilst also investing £1.5 billion in its extensive network of assets and helping more than 100,000 customers who genuinely struggle to pay their bills. This will help Welsh Water to continue providing the most essential of public services to over three million people across much of Wales, Herefordshire and parts of Deeside.

In preparing its Business Plan, Welsh Water undertook its largest ever programme of customer engagement and research. The Business Plan was endorsed by 94% of customers during the engagement and research programme which was overseen by an independent Customer Challenge Group.

Chris Jones, Chief Executive of Welsh Water, said: "As a company without any shareholders, our sole focus is on earning the trust of our customers by providing the best possible water and wastewater service at the most affordable price.

"During this challenging price review, we needed to balance a number of priorities between making service improvements, safeguarding the environment whilst also keeping bills affordable by ensuring that we deliver a decade of below inflation price increases by 2020.  Our customers have played a key part in shaping a very ambitious Business Plan that sets challenging performance targets for us between 2015 and 2020."