npower agrees to pay £3.5million to help vulnerable customers

Ofgem’s investigation found that npower had breached its marketing licence conditions. npower accepts this finding and has agreed to pay £3.5 million which will directly benefit vulnerable consumers.
 
Ofgem’s investigation centred on the sales processes and information used by npower when customers were making decisions about whether to switch supplies to npower.  
 
The decision reflects the fact that while npower was making changes to its sales processes, these fell short of the standards set by Ofgem’s tougher 2009 marketing rules. These shortcomings in npower’s processes have been fully remedied. All breaches ceased by September 2012. 
 
Ofgem’s Senior Partner in charge of enforcement Sarah Harrison said: “npower has done the right thing by stepping forward and recognising that, whilst it was making changes to improve its sales processes, weaknesses remained which affected consumers’ ability to compare supplier offers fairly.  These issues have been fully addressed by npower and Ofgem welcomes the company’s actions and its agreement to pay £3.5m to directly benefit vulnerable consumers.
 
“Ofgem will continue to hold companies to account to ensure rules to protect energy consumers are met and that the market works for consumers in a simpler, clearer and fairer way.”