Jersey gas outage: Company started out review 'from scratch'

Jersey's gas company started its review "from scratch" on how it handled a loss of supplies after an outage.

Some people were left without gas for 10 days last October due to a failure of Island Energy's (IE) software.

More than 250 people are seeking to claim additional compensation after IE previously offered an £11.56 refund as a "goodwill gesture".

IE said there was "no additional review" being carried out into the goodwill gesture.

Up to 4,500 homes and businesses were without gas following a loss of power at La Collette power station.

IE, which previously offered an £11.56 refund as a "goodwill gesture", had previously said more compensation was not required as the technical fault that caused the issue had been "beyond our control".

However, some customers described the offer as "derisory" and "completely shameful" and said more compensation should be offered.

The firm has pointed out there is no legislation in place in Jersey for any company to provide compensation to customers.

IE said: "We would like to apologise once again to our customers for the disruption to the supply of gas in Jersey and thank them for bearing with us while we worked to restore supply, and while we conducted our review.

"There is no pre-agreed system in place for energy companies to provide compensation. It is not a requirement of doing business in Jersey.

"[We] therefore started from scratch to review the outage, our customers' contracts and what we can feasibly do to make a payment without generating excess costs to our business - as these would ultimately be passed on to our customers.

"Businesses are very different to domestic customers and have been assessed separately.

"Most of our business customers will have engaged with their insurers as this type of disruption will usually be covered to a greater degree by their policies than we could ever offer as compensation. This is therefore the route most will have gone down."

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