Kundenservice in der deutschen Wasserwirtschaft – Eine Analyse der Internetauftritte ausgewählter Unternehmen

Abstract

There is a lack of competition in the German water and sewerage sector. According to economic theory levels of service can be expected to be inefficient. I will check this hypothesis and therefore take a closer look at various categories of levels of service. In analysing the internet pages of main German water and sewerage companies I exclusively work with those indicators of levels of service which do not need much capital investment in order to be improved. Most of these indicators are similar to those used in England. Therefore it is possible to compare the performances in levels of service in these two countries. I come to the conclusion that service offered by English companies is significantly better and in most cases more efficient than service offered by German ones. I therefore deduce that the main reason for that difference is in fact the existence of more competition in the English water and sewerage sector.Water; Sewerage; Levels of service; Germany; Regulation