Water companies have announced further price rises that come into effect from April 2013.
The average price increase is 3.5%, costing consumers £13 more a year and bringing the average annual cost of water and sewerage to £388.
The highest, (surprise, surprise) is again Southern Water who are raising prices by 5.5%, costing an average of £21 more for their unfortunate customers. The rises are well above the current CPI of 2.7%, although the 3% RPI rate was used to calculate the price rises allowed by regulator Ofwat. This latest price hike comes on top of Southern Water's inflation busting 8.2% increase last year and is made even worse as it is "an increase on an increase"
Whilst business customers are to be allowed to shop around for their water supplier, householders are trapped paying whatever the water companies are allowed by Ofwat to demand.
The Consumer Council for Water said:
"higher-than-anticipated inflation figures for the past two years have meant customers have ended up paying more than they might have expected."
They are calling for Ofwat to review the way price increases are calculated, to ensure water companies to put the hard pressed customer's interests ahead of shareholder dividend payments, paid from the huge profits the water companies make.
