The flow of water from the kitchen tap at my home was down to a trickle a couple of night ago.  I checked the water main to see if someone had tampered with it and all seemed in order.  I reluctantly called South East Water – I say reluctantly because calling by experience calling any utility is one of spending too long navigating a computerised phone system only to not get an answer to my question.

Within 90 seconds of calling South east Water I found out that there was a burst water main a couple of streets away and that it would be fixed by 1am.  The experience showed me that a utility can provide good customer service if they want.

Based on my recent experiences, Foxtel and Telstra could learn a lot from South east Water on how to provide good customer service.