British Gas to hire 500 staff to help people who face soaring bills

theguardian.com:

British Gas is to beef up its customer services team to deal with the sharp rise in the number of distressed customers who are struggling to cope with soaring bills, as its owner, Centrica, predicted annual profits will hit the top end of expectations.

The company is to recruit another 500 people to field calls from the growing number of people who are facing higher energy bills at a time when the wider cost of living is outpacing wage growth, piling pressure on household budgets.

A spokesperson for Centrica said that demand for customer services had been “phenomenal” over the past year. “We’re taking on extra employees to manage that demand,” the spokesperson said. “Customers are very concerned about rising energy costs and we want to help them as much as we can.”

The average household dual fuel tariff jumped to just under £2,000 a year on 1 April, when the UK’s energy regulator raised the price cap by 54% to reflect sky-high wholesale gas prices. Bills are poised to rise further at the next energy price cap review in October.

Centrica said in a trading statement on Tuesday that it expects 2022 operating profits to come at the top end of City forecasts, which range from £739m to £1.4bn.

The chancellor, Rishi Sunak, has been heavily criticised for not doing enough to help low-income households, and calls for a windfall tax on energy producers such as BP and Shell have intensified after they made billions in profits on the back of higher oil and gas prices.

Centrica has also beefed up the British Gas energy support fund, set up in December, which has tripled in value since then to £6m. It provides grants of up to £750 to help vulnerable customers pay their energy bills.

The fund has paid out £1.9m to 3,600 customers so far,