Recommendation 7 : “Allow input of a foreign telephone number as contact number for a customer in the supplier’s information system”
0- Follow-up to the recommendation
The country dialling code +33 is pre-stored in the information system of ENGIE Grand Public, ENGIE Gaz Tarif Réglementé and ENGIE Happe, and cannot be modified to date. Input of a foreign telephone number will be studied as part of a new customer-supplier management tool (planned for the end of 2019).
1- Observation
The customer took out an electricity supply contract for his second home in France, his habitual residence being located in the United Kingdom.No reading could be taken between 18 July 2016 and 6 March 2018, the date on which the customer took a reading. Further to a dispute about a bill, the supplier sent distributor ENEDIS a request for a visual check of the customer’s meter.
After several attempts to make an appointment, the customer travelled to his second home to enable the distributor to take a reading. However the distributor did not do so, as it was unable to contact the customer.
2- Mediation solution
During this case the Mediation service noticed that the telephone number entered by the customer when he took out the contract was a fax number. The customer could therefore not be contacted on that number. When the customer took out the contract with the supplier, he could not provide his English telephone number because the supplier’s web site only allowed French numbers to be entered.
3- Generic observation
The supplier’s information system can only store French telephone numbers (with the +33 country code). The supplier’s customers domiciled abroad can still be contacted by e-mail bot not by telephone. This can cause problems in relations with the distributor, in particular when making appointments for maintenance work.
4- Recommendation / Generic solution
The ENGIE Group’s Mediation service recommends that the supplier modifies its information system to allow customers to enter a foreign telephone number.