OREANDA-NEWS. September 30, 2015. SSE has again been named the best performing energy firm by Citizens Advice – with a complaint score 20 times less than the worst performing supplier’.

SSE keeps top spot in the advice body’s quarterly Energy Supplier Performance report, a position it has held every quarter since records began in 2009.

The latest figures, for the period April to June 2015, give SSE a complaints score of 47.7 per 100,000 customers, comfortably outperforming not only the larger suppliers but also independents like Ovo, First:Utility and Good Energy.

This is the first time the league table has been updated to include complaints performance for all of the 18 largest energy suppliers operating in the UK market, challenging assumptions that switching to a smaller supplier will lead to better customer service.

Will Morris, SSE’s Managing Director Retail, said:  “This report puts to rest the myth that smaller is always better when it comes to getting great service from your energy supplier. We have proved time and again that we are the best in the business when it comes to resolving issues for customers swiftly and this reflects the passion and hard work of our UK-based customer service team.” 

This month, SSE was also named best major energy supplier for customer service following a survey by consumer advice service Which?.

The survey asked 3,500 members of the public for their views on the 100 biggest consumer brands in the UK and SSE was ranked joint 51st place overall alongside firms like Superdrug, ASOS, Morrisons and Asda and above major customer-centric brands, including Sky, O2, Ebay and Virgin.

And, in a hat-trick of customer service successes, the total number of complaints accepted by the Ombudsman: Energy from SSE customers was the lowest of all the UK’s ten largest suppliers for the first six month of 2015.

SSE is continuing to work hard to raise the bar when it comes to complaint handling. In March, SSE became the only supplier to advise customers of their right to take an unresolved complaint to the Ombudsman after six weeks instead of the industry standard eight. And last month SSE announced it would be going one better and bringing this time down to four weeks – twice as fast as any other supplier.

Will Morris added: “We already receive fewer complaints than anyone in the industry but we won’t stop there. One complaint is one too many and, if things do go wrong, customers should know we’ll do all we can to put them right and that it won’t drag on forever. We want to fix any issues as quickly and directly as possible, while giving customers the peace of mind of knowing that they can get independent guidance sooner rather than later. We will soon be twice as fast as anyone else on this and would urge all suppliers to follow our lead.”

This latest step is part of a series of measures SSE is taking to improve the experience of its customers, as outlined in its latest annual Treating Customers Fairly Statement.