Written by: Gareth Copland, Group Operations Director

Updated on: 19th April 2023

When we decided to move our contact centre to Peterborough a year ago, we knew it would help our customer services team to better deliver their services to our residents, but we did not foresee the extent to which our customer service has gone from strength to strength. 

A market-leading Trustpilot rating

In just one and a half years, our Trustpilot rating went from 1.5 to 4.7 out of 5 stars. Across the one thousand reviews we received by February 2021, 83% of customers rated us ‘Excellent’, making Insite Energy a top-rated heat network metering & billing provider in the UK.

Figure 1: The average star rating Insite Energy received on Trustpilot each month between August 2019 and February 2021 (source: Trustpilot)

To improve our customer services, we aimed to improve our waiting times and resolve issues in a more efficient, knowledgeable, and friendly way. This has been reflected in many of the reviews we received on Trustpilot: 

“Extremely efficient and personable experience. A lovely representative called Bobbie was extremely helpful and gracious during our conversation. Although my enquiry was short and easy, she made it a pleasure to call Insite Energy and strengthened my affection for the company! You guys are doing something right! And special shout out to Bobbie, good luck in that competition!”

“Put the other energy companies to shame. Had a great experience with Christian, who listened and help me resolve a niggling matter. They have always given me the impression it's a small company, with smart people on the phone. You don't have to keep repeating yourself, they just 'get it' - thanks guys for your help.”

“Easy and lovely call. After close to no wait at all, I explained my issue and questions, which were immediately understood and treated very quickly. Andrew was clear, he explained everything and was able to solve my problems/answer my questions straight away. He also explained to me the line was secure when I gave my bank details, which I appreciated. He had a lovely, friendly overall attitude! :)”

We are grateful to everyone who has taken the time to give us their feedback. Whether positive or with some constructive feedback – as we love to learn from our mistakes – we appreciate all your messages! 

Empathy is core to our company culture. This is also reflected in how our customer service advisors interact with our residents. First and foremost, they do not work off scripts, as these can often be littered with insufficient answers. Our webchat is also managed by real people and not an automated service to ensure the conversation is less frustrating. Prior to closing a case on our customer relationship management (CRM) software, we also focus on taking the time to talk to residents on a case-by-case basis to make sure their queries, questions and issues are fully resolved. All of this has been at the heart of our success. 

A customer services team you can count on

Coming out of the coronavirus pandemic, which was shortly followed by the cost-of-living crisis, the level of responsiveness from our dedicated customer services team has allowed us to give our clients the support they needed during these challenging times. 

With the recent energy price rises and many people spending more time at home, some have experienced higher-than-expected energy bills. Understandably, this has had an exponential effect on call centre demand. For many residents, heat networks are new, and it is not always clear how their heating & hot water tariffs are calculated.

A year after our move to the Peterborough office and setting up individual microsites for each development, most basic queries were satisfied without the inconvenience of phone calls clearly reflected by our customer service performance data. 

Figure 2: Insite Energy's customer service metrics drastically improved from 2019 to 2020.

Reduced call waiting times, increased customer satisfaction

Despite an increase in demand directly following the COVID-19 pandemic, we’ve been able to keep the call centre’s average wait time to just 53 seconds in 2020. That was around 27 times lower than British Gas and put us in the top two call handling times across all UK energy companies.

Figure 3: Insite Energy's call centre's average wait times (AWT) compared to that of other energy company's in the UK (source: Which?, 2020)

On top of this we took less time to answer a customer’s query both over the phone and via email, with 86% of our incoming email queries resolved within 24. Both of these have had a positive impact on our customer satisfaction as the number of complaints was reduced to less than one percent. 

“Having been able to continuously improve our service levels over the past year under difficult circumstances is a testament to the quality of the people and systems that we have in place in Peterborough,” said Gareth Copland, Insite Energy's Client Services Director. “We took a decision to create a dedicated contact centre with state-of-the-art technology and very experienced, exceptionally high-caliber staff, that we continue to invest in through ongoing development. It’s great to see that it’s paying off.” 

Whilst we are seeing a positive change, we are always looking to improve our services so we can be the top-rated energy provider across all categories. Our team that genuinely cares about our customers, and supporting them with the technology they need to carry out their hobs efficiently, has certainly been a great place to start.