Putting customers first
· Customers benefiting from better service, greater resilience and improved efficiency
· Delivering value through greater use of innovation and advanced technology alongside our £3.8bn AMP6 capital investment programme
· Sharing outperformance through additional investment in resilience increased from £100m to £250m
· Leading customer satisfaction scores achieved
· Supporting more than 50,000 customers in need of help through our Priority Services scheme
Strong operational performance enables improved AMP6 guidance
· Industry leading environmental and water quality performance scores achieved
· Confident of delivering totex outperformance of £100m against our AMP6 allowance
· Expect cumulative AMP6 ODI reward
Preparing well for AMP7 and beyond
· Advanced in our PR19 plans informed by extensive engagement with customers, balancing investment with affordability
· Leading performer giving us confidence heading into AMP7 and beyond
Strong financial performance
· Underlying operating profit of £645.1m (reported operating profit of £636.4m)
· Dividend in line with AMP6 growth policy
· Robust capital structure, leading pensions position and consistently responsible gearing
Key financials
|
Continuing operations |
Year ended |
|
|
31 March 2018 |
31 March 2017 |
|
|
Revenue |
£1,735.8m |
£1,704.0m |
|
Reported operating profit |
£636.4m |
£605.5m |
|
Underlying operating profit1 |
£645.1m |
£622.9m |
|
Reported profit after tax |
£354.6m |
£433.9m |
|
Underlying profit after tax1 |
£304.9m |
£313.4m |
|
Total dividend per ordinary share (pence) |
39.73p |
38.87p |
|
Net regulatory capital spend |
£816.1m |
£803.7m |
|
RCV gearing2 |
61% |
61% |
1 Underlying profit measures have been provided to give a more representative view of business performance and are defined in the underlying profit measure tables
2 Regulatory capital value (RCV) gearing calculated as group net debt/United Utilities Water's shadow RCV (outturn prices)
Steve Mogford, Chief Executive Officer, said:
“We continue to put customers first. Our approach to vulnerability and affordability is setting new benchmarks for the industry and our sustained improvement in customer satisfaction positions us as a leader in the sector. This year, we achieved our best ever scores against Ofwat's qualitative Service Incentive Mechanism (SIM), positioning us first in the industry in the final survey of the year. Our best practice in this area has received external recognition through several awards, many of which look beyond the water sector.
“Our approach to innovation and Systems Thinking is radically changing the way we operate and leading the way for the industry. We are using advanced technology from around the world and across different sectors to deliver better service, greater resilience and improved efficiency. This is contributing to outperformance in the current regulatory period which we are sharing with customers in the form of £250 million of additional investment in resilience projects.
“The significant progress we have made positions us well as we look towards the next regulatory period and gives us confidence that we can rise to the longer-term challenges resulting from a growing population, affordability concerns and the impact of more volatile weather. We will build on the trust our customers place in us to provide an outstanding service, invest wisely and efficiently, driving further innovation and creating value for all our stakeholders.”