Challenge
Spark Energy occupied a unique position in the UK energy market, onboarding over 10,000 home movers each month through letting agent partners. Despite this advantage, engaging rental customers remained difficult. Direct debit penetration was low, bad debt risk was increasing, and call centres were overwhelmed with repetitive, low-value enquiries. Customer wait times stretched to 30 minutes, resulting in poor experience and high operational costs
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Solution
Equator partnered with Spark Energy to deliver a significant shift in digital engagement and channel usage. The aim was to boost self-service adoption, enhance payment behaviour, and ease the load on contact centres.
- Designed a new digital-first customer proposition with clear language and visual identity
- Delivered a suite of integrated customer tools, including live chat, chatbot, click-to-text, and a dynamic customer portal
- Integrated all digital journeys directly with billing systems and CRM
- Introduced Ami, an automated service assistant designed to handle high-volume, low-complexity interactions
- Enabled Ami to manage meter readings, sign-ups, balance enquiries, and payments
- Delivered rapid deployment with full system connectivity in under 48 hours
- Implemented tracking, targets, and reporting to drive sustained channel shift
Results
25% increase in customer sign-ups
Customer base grew to 400,00
20% increase in meter read
Ami handled up to 60% of inbound calls at peak time
Reduced call waiting times and improved staff productivity
Outcome
Spark Energy revolutionised how it engages rental customers. By transitioning service and payments to digital-first journeys and automation, Spark reduced operational costs, improved payment compliance, and provided a better customer experience at scale. The programme unlocked retention value in a traditionally hard-to-serve segment while significantly lowering bad debt risk.