CCW: Customer Experience Survey

Background & Context

CCW commissioned M·E·L Research to understand customer experiences of its Dedicated Support Team, a new function launched in April 2025 to provide additional support to customers with accessibility needs, customers who had requested reasonable adjustments, and others who needed a more bespoke service while CCW handled their complaints.

The work sat in the context of earlier qualitative research by M·E·L Research, which had identified key service priorities including active listening, knowledgeable advisers, clear expectations, and action and accountability. 

CCW wanted independent customer feedback on whether the service was working from the customer perspective. The research needed to explore whether customers felt listened to, how accessible the service was, what was working well, what could be improved, and how the support compared with experiences of other utility providers.

Approach

M·E·L Research designed a quantitative customer survey among people who had used CCW’s Dedicated Support Team. CCW provided a customer sample, including names, email addresses and reference numbers, with potential supporting information such as water company, complaint outcome and whether the case had progressed to ADR (which could be appended to respondents and used for analysis).

The main method was an online survey. The questionnaire was designed, scripted and hosted by M·E·L Research, and covered customer effort, satisfaction, service strengths and weaknesses, areas for improvement, demographics for analysis, and permission to recontact customers for further research.

The research followed a staged process: questionnaire development and agreement, sample provision, scripting and testing, live fieldwork, analysis and reporting. The proposal was based on contacting customers from a pool of around 700 service users, with the set-up discussion noting that CCW expected to share as much sample as possible to provide a strong base for response.

Outputs

M·E·L Research analysed the survey findings to assess overall customer experience, including customer effort, satisfaction, accessibility, perceived strengths and areas for improvement. Where sample information allowed, the findings could also be reviewed by useful sub-groups such as water company, complaint outcome or ADR status.

The outputs comprised full anonymised data tables, a PowerPoint report and a verbal debrief. The PowerPoint format was selected because it provided a practical, shareable format for CCW teams.

The findings were intended to support service improvement for the Dedicated Support Team. They provided CCW with evidence on whether customers felt the new service was working for them, whether communication and contact routes were accessible, and what further enhancements could strengthen support for customers with additional needs. This included recommendations for how CCW should talk about this team to vulnerable customers who may not understand the nature of additional support offered.