REG - Thames Wtr Util. Ltd Thames Wtr.Utltes. Thames Wtr (Kemble) - Appointment of CEO

AccentureAnnouncement

22/04/2020 08:05

RNS Number : 4196K
  
Thames Water Utilities Limited
  
22 April 2020
  
 

 
 
Sarah Bentley to be new chief executive of Thames Water
 
Thames Water has today announced the appointment of Sarah Bentley as chief executive officer, starting this autumn.
 
During her time at Severn Trent, Sarah has been the chief customer officer responsible for customer retail and network operations, group technology and transformation.
 
Ian Marchant, Thames Water's interim executive chairman, said: "Our board has conducted a thorough search to find the best candidate to fill this important role, and we're delighted to have secured someone of Sarah's calibre. Her natural ability to inspire and motivate customer-facing teams will ensure that our collective focus is always on delivering for our customers regardless of the circumstances we face, not least those we're all experiencing today.
 
"Sarah has invaluable experience in the water sector and has demonstrated an outstanding ability to innovate and meet customer needs in a regulated environment. This is a critical time for the company, and alongside her passion for customers, Sarah is clearly the perfect person to lead our multi-billion pound investment programme and develop our longer term strategy to ensure a resilient water and waste service for generations to come."
 
Among her achievements, Sarah led the transformation of Severn Trent's digital customer experience, as well as delivering a fundamental shift in the company's leakage performance - leading to significant improvements in customer satisfaction.
 
Before Severn Trent, Sarah was managing director of Accenture's digital business unit in the UK & Ireland, delivering digital transformation programmes to a range of large consumer-facing businesses. Prior to this she worked internationally in a number of roles, including CEO of Datapoint, a private equity-backed company delivering customer relationship management services.
 
Sarah said: "Firstly I want to thank everyone across the water and wastewater sector for their absolute dedication and service in these challenging times. I am delighted to be joining Thames Water, a business that clearly plays an essential role in London and the Thames Valley and which has such a strong sense of public value. I look forward to working with the team to deliver a service that delights our customers, create a company where our colleagues are proud to work and build a business that is recognised for making a positive contribution to the communities we serve and the environment around us."
 
Ian Marchant will continue in his position as interim executive chairman until Sarah joins the company, at which point he will revert back to his role as chairman of Thames Water.
 
ENDS
 
Notes to editors
For more information, contact Stuart White in the Thames Water press office on 07747 644364 or email stuart.white@thameswater.co.uk.
 
Sarah Bentley biography
Sarah joined Severn Trent plc in 2014 as chief customer officer and is a member of the executive committee. Severn Trent is a UK FTSE 100 company serving 8 million customers with water and wastewater services across the Midlands. She leads both the consumer retail division and the wholesale network operations unit alongside her responsibilities as group CIO.
 
Before joining Severn Trent, Sarah was the managing partner for Accenture's digital business unit in the UK & Ireland delivering digital transformation programs to a range of large UK consumer-facing businesses and was a member of the Accenture UK and Ireland executive committee.
 
Sarah previously worked internationally in a number of roles including strategy, marketing and propositions for BT's Global Services division, CEO of Datapoint, an Alchemy-backed company delivering customer relationship management (CRM) services throughout Europe, and senior vice president of eLoyalty, a global CRM and marketing consultancy. She was SVP of the European business, led the sales and operations activity in North America and ran eLoyalty Ventures L.L.C. working in Silicon Valley, Austin and New York.
 
She graduated from the University of Kent with a first class honours degree in management science and computing (BSc Hons) and is married with five children. Sarah is also non-executive director of Lloyds Bank plc and Bank of Scotland plc and director and secretary of Twizzletwig Limited.
 
Remuneration
Sarah will receive an annual salary of £750k, pension allowance of 12% of salary, which is aligned to the pension allowance for the workforce, and other benefits/car allowance of £30k pa. She will be able to participate in the company's existing annual bonus scheme up to a maximum of 120% of salary, and a long-term incentive plan with an annual award up to a maximum of 200% of salary.
 
These variable pay elements will be dependent on achieving specified performance improvements in key areas including leakage, pollutions and customer service. The Thames Water long term incentive plan (LTIP) is a 3-year scheme and the first payment for Sarah can be made in 2023 at the earliest. This CEO remuneration package was carefully considered by the remuneration committee and was benchmarked against other water companies and other London and South East utility companies.
 
These remuneration arrangements are consistent with the remuneration policy and in line with standard company terms and conditions.
 
In addition, as Sarah transitions to the Thames Water incentive scheme, it has been agreed to compensate Sarah for surrendering her potential bonus, deferred bonuses and long term incentives from Severn Trent. Thames Water has estimated this as a maximum of c£3.1m, payable over the course of the next three financial years. An element of this award will be subject to the achievement of targets to be set in relation to Thames Water's return on retained earnings (RoRE), customer and environment performance over a two-year period from April 1, 2020.
 
About Thames Water
Thames Water is the UK's biggest water and wastewater services provider. Our key workers provide essential services around the clock to 15 million customers across London, the Thames Valley and surrounding areas.
 
For an average of just over £1 a day for our households, we provide 2.7 billion litres of drinking water and safely remove 4.4 billion litres of wastewater every day.
 
We invested more than £1 billion again in 2019/20, leading to a total of £15 billion in the past 15 years, and we will continue to spend wisely on improving resilience, service and efficiency, as well as provide more support for customers in vulnerable circumstances.   
 
We also have additional responsibilities to society and the natural environment. What we do and how we do it delivers significant public value, which is why we have ambitious plans to self-generate more of our own power, reduce our carbon emissions and increase biodiversity across our sites.  


This information is provided by RNS, the news service of the London Stock Exchange. RNS is approved by the Financial Conduct Authority to act as a Primary Information Provider in the United Kingdom. Terms and conditions relating to the use and distribution of this information may apply. For further information, please contact rns@lseg.com or visit www.rns.com.
 
  END
 
 
BOAPPUMCCUPUPGG