Water2business, the specialist retailer co-owned by Bristol Water, has become the first company of its kind to achieve the top score for customer service on the international review website Trustpilot.
The firm, which has 82,000 customers across the UK, said landing the perfect 5.0 rating recognised its efforts to excel in customer service. 
Founded in 2017 when the water retail market opened to competition, Nailsea-based Water2business has since achieved substantial commercial growth, winning national contracts with customers across multiple sectors and delivering savings for them with tailored water and wastewater management plans.
It started proactively collecting Trustpilot reviews in 2020 and since then has gained 788, which it uses as marketing material to retain existing customers and attract new business.
The Trustpilot score works over a rolling 12-month period. Of the 117 reviews received by Water2business, 115 of them were five-star ratings, with just two four star.
Managing director Andy Coates, pictured, said in the past he and his team had discussed aiming for the ‘holy grail’ of customer service excellence on Trustpilot – but had never thought it possible to achieve what no other water company ever has – a perfect score.
He added: “I am extremely proud of this truly remarkable achievement. It is down to the hard work of all our staff and their commitment to delivering excellent customer service day in, day out.”
Having maintained a strong score – 4.8 to 4.9 from 2020 to 2021 and then 4.9 for the past three years – Water2business bosses had assumed that obtaining 5.0 was almost impossible.
“Lo and behold this week we’ve managed it,” said Andy.
“Our historical performance speaks for itself – only eight reviews in five years have been below four stars and in the past 12 months, we have no reviews below four-star. This consistency is what has finally driven our score to 5.0.”
The key to achieving a high ranking was to proactively assess all reviews, provide an immediate response, and look for trends both good and bad within the responses, he added.
Any review below a four-star rating is treated as a complaint by the firm and immediately escalated to the director of customer services, who will contact the customer and try to resolve any issues.
This has resulted in converting a number of low scores to an improved four or five-star rating.
Andy added: “This approach alongside our great consistency of service has driven us to be the first and only water company to achieve a 5.0 score.
“We have around 70 staff, and 80,000 customers from large supermarkets to football clubs and hotel chains.
“Quite a lot of the time, customers use Trustpilot as a forum to vent – we ensure they are heard and we react, respond and resolve quickly.”
Trustpilot hosts reviews of businesses worldwide. Nearly 1m new reviews are posted each month.
Water2business is co-owned by Bath-headquartered Wessex Water – part of the Malaysian YTL conglomerate behind the Brabazon development at Filton.
It was set up to supply the two utilities’ business customers with specialist services such as water efficiency audits, environmental performance, trade effluent services, expert account management, billing options, smart metering, benchmarking and expert advice on water supply and management.
Its customers include manufacturer Pirelli Tyres, Japanese restaurant chain itsu, UK-wide café chain Coffee#1 and health care Advinia.
