Priority services for customers in vulnerable circumstances

We all need extra support from time-to-time whether it’s due to disability, ill health, age, financial worries or language barriers.

Our Priority Services Register (PSR) aims to provide this support.

As of 31 March 2023, we had 73,813 people signed up to our PSR register, but we know there are more people out there who may need our assistance.

To increase the number signed up to the register during 2022/23, while also ensuring those who are signed up are receiving the most appropriate service from us, we had a variety of new targets to hit:

• To have 7 per cent of our total properties served signed up to our PSR register (PSR reach)
• Of those customers signed up, to contact 90 per cent of them over a two-year period to make sure they are receiving the most appropriate service (attempted contact)
• Of those customers signed up, to directly contact 35 per cent of customers registered on the PSR over a two-year period to make sure they are receiving the most appropriate service (actual contact)

How have we performed?

At the end of the year, we achieved our target of having 7.0 per cent of customers signed up to the PSR register, reaching 8.03 per cent. This was achieved by registering 25,786 households during 2022/23.

This has been achieved through working in partnership with regional stakeholders, who work in this field to help identify customers who are eligible for the service, as well as through as through the media and wider awareness campaigns.

For our PSR customers who have been registered for more than two years, we also have the additional data revalidation targets, to make sure they are still applicable to PSR. These measures target Actual and Attempted contacts for revalidation. During the year, we achieved 54.67 per cent actual contact and revalidation of data against the target of 35 per cent.

Also, we attempted to contact 90.44 per cent of our customers who have been on the PSR for more than two years at least twice.

This means that we have outperformed all our targets for the year relating to PSR service provision.