British Gas is planning to create hundreds of new jobs in the coming weeks within its customer services teams which it said would help customers struggling to pay their bills. The energy giant said it is creating 700 jobs by the end of the year at its service centres in Stockport, Leicester, Leeds, Edinburgh and Cardiff.
The company said it is also rolling out extra training to help customers in financial difficulty – saying although energy prices have come down, lots of people are still desperate for support.
Chris O’Shea, chief executive of British Gas parent company Centrica, said: “Although energy prices have come down slightly, many of our customers are still struggling overall with the cost of living and need to speak to us for longer about their energy bills.
“Strengthening our UK call centre operations will allow us to help more households with expert advice and support during this time.
“I’m extremely proud of how our expert teams support our customers every day – in the past year they’ve helped over one million customers who’ve been struggling to afford their bills with additional support such as grants, debt relief and payment plans.”
British Gas said the new workers would all be in post by the end of the year with further hiring in January as part of the company’s aim to move call centre operations back to the UK.
The business said there was an increase in call volumes last winter due to the energy crisis and said it invested £25 million in its customer services operations to help meet that demand.
It has a £100 million support package in place to help customers who are struggling with energy costs – which it said is the biggest voluntary support package offered by a UK supplier.
Additional training in how its customer services teams can help customers in financial difficulty will include directing them to available support.
It said that as well as hiring UK call centre staff, it will continue to train apprentices to help accelerate the drive to net zero and to fix boilers and ensure people are heating their homes efficiently over the winter.
The company has promised to hire 3,500 new apprentices by 2030.
