Annual Report 2016 | Page 6

Annual Report 2016 STRATEGIC REPORT EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Group overview, strategy and business model South Staffordshire Plc is a highly respected integrated services group of businesses with a regulated water supply company, South Staffs Water, comprising two operational regions, South Staffs and Cambridge, and two non-regulated service divisions, SSI Services and Echo. The Group’s strategy is to continue to grow by providing high levels of service quality while remaining price competitive in all of its operations, through driving continuing efficiency and maintaining a safe and enjoyable working environment. Details of how this strategy is implemented across the Group and the individual divisional strategies, business models and business plans are provided throughout the Strategic Report. South Staffs Water In the first year of delivery of the new AMP6 period, South Staffs Water achieved good performance against most of its Outcome Delivery Incentives including the business’ best result in customer supply interruptions in the last 15 years and seeing strong results in Ofwat’s measure of customer service performance (SIM). 4 Through a multimillion pound investment in UV technology at the business’ Seedy Mill treatment works, which is due for completion in this new year, and investment planned for the Hampton Loade treatment works, the business is responding positively to the requirement to improve its water quality performance. As the shape of the water industry is set to change significantly, South Staffs Water is preparing its systems, processes and organisational structures in preparation for the non-household retail business opening up fully for competition in April 2017. SSI Services SSI Services had a very positive year, with encouraging operational performance on some key contracts, important new contract awards and achieving growth in both its turnover and profitability. The IWS business has seen a positive year having performed well on some of its most important contracts. The OnSite business had a slow start to the year, due to the start of the new AMP period, however the newly formed Rail division gained momentum with some significant contract awards, with the second half of the year much busier for the business. SSI Services is now in a strong position to continue to grow its revenue with enhancement of existing product and service offerings and new disciplines being offered. Echo Echo is helping its water company customers to deliver service excellence to customers through the deployment of RapidXtra, its market leading billing software, with this part of the business having another excellent year. The business holds a strong position in the debt collection services market, has achieved new contract awards and is now able to offer end-to-end debt recovery services focusing on the importance of the customer experience and early intervention.