Southern Water to meet customers in Hastings

Our teams will hold a drop-in event to provide an update on how we're progressing with our improvement plans and discuss water bills, wastewater and other issues our customers have in Hastings.  

The event will be held at the Stade Hall in Hastings, on Thursday 5 September 2024. Doors will open at 10am and close at 6.30pm.  

This will give us the chance to talk to visitors about ongoing Southern Water activity in the Hastings area. 

Tim Mcmahon, Managing Director for Water at Southern Water, said: “We work closely with Hastings Borough Council and since the public meeting in July earlier this year, we’ve made plans to tackle the issues raised.  

We understand that our performance must improve to help our customers and the local community. That’s why we have plans to invest £41.4 million at the Bexhill and Hastings Wastewater Treatment Works from 2025 – 2030.  

Plus, businesses and community groups in the Hastings and St Leonards area are receiving a share of a £1 million goodwill fund following the weather-related flooding and loss of water supply incidents.  

We’re here to listen to residents and are really stepping up our efforts in the local area. We’re keen to work closer with all of our stakeholders, especially those at Hastings Borough Council. 

Attendees will also be able to talk to us about any remaining concerns following the loss of water supply incident earlier this year, which affected many customers, and they’ll also find out what we’re doing to make sure there is resilience moving forward.”  

The company’s activities in the Hastings area include:   

·       £41.4 million investment planned for the 2025-2030 period at the Bexhill and Hastings Wastewater Treatment Works to reduce the number of spills from the site. 

·       Businesses and community groups in the Hastings and St Leonards area are receiving a share of a £1 million goodwill fund following the weather-related flooding and loss of water supply incidents. More detail here

·       From the public meeting we had with Hastings Borough Council earlier this year, we’ve committed to set up a Hastings Taskforce. 

·       Our Asset Management team is developing a resilience improvement plan for the Hastings system, where improvements will start from the beginning of 2025. This is to support the short-term resilience improvements currently being delivered by the local operational team. 

·       We’re investing in programmes aimed at improving customer service and reducing customer outage. 

·       As a company we’re planning to replace over 300km of water mains regionally to address leakage, protecting future resources, and aged assets.  

·       Help with bills and financial support available for those struggling to pay.  

·       How we’re working with partners to fix local misconnections that have caused pollutions.  

We’ll have teams from across the business in attendance, including from our Customer team who can offer support and advice on bills.   

The following teams will be on hand to speak to customers:  

·       Our Water Supply and Water Network team  

·       Our Wastewater Assets and Wastewater Network team  

·       Affordability and Customer Services  

·       Community and Stakeholder team  

·       Customer Service and Support 

·       Major Investments 

Customers will also have chance to hear about our plans for infrastructure and service improvements during 2025-30, called PR24 further details are here