Senior management at Scottish and Southern Energy Power Distribution (‘SSEPD’) have met with local MPs and their teams in Westminster to discuss the company’s investments to ensure its network is robust, resilient and ready to meet the challenges of a typical British winter.
As well as upgrades to the electricity network so that it can stand up to gale force winds and torrential rainfalls, SSEPD has also been investing heavily in its behind the scenes operations so it can continue to give its 3.6 million customers the best service possible. A key part to this programme has been SSEPD’s ongoing engagement with local resilience groups, councils and parish councils and the Westminster session was an extension of what has already been a very successful exercise.
Stuart Hogarth, SSEPD’s Director of Distribution said: “This has been a great chance for local MPs to come along and chat with us face-to-face and learn more about the wide range of investments and preparations we’ve made ahead of this winter.
“We do everything we can to ensure that our network is able to withstand just about anything Mother Nature decides to throw at us. However, there are still occasions when even despite our best investments, the power may go off for a short time, and that is why, since last winter we’ve been implementing improvements to the way we keep our customers updated during a power cut.”
Alongside Stuart yesterday was Bev Keogh, the company’s Head of Operations in central southern England, who took the opportunity to highlight SSEPD’s ‘Priority Service Register”: “When the power goes off it can be particularly distressing for our customers who rely on electricity for medical equipment or who are perhaps elderly or have a young baby in the family. These are the types of customers we want to sign up to our Priority Service Register, so that we can give them extra care and support when the power is off. We’re always looking to get more customers onto the register and so it was great to discuss this with our guests, with many of them asking us to send them more information so that they can share it with their constituents.”
Please visit http://www.ssepd.co.uk/PriorityServices/ for more information on our Priority Services Register
Pictured: Stuart Hogarth, Alan Reid MP and Bev Keogh