“Unsettling time” for customers as water provider reports nearly £17bn of debt
Thames Water lost over £1.5bn last financial year
Last updated 18th Aug 2025
The Consumer Council for Water says it's an “unsettling time” for Thames Water customers.
The water provider has reported a loss of £1.65bn for the year to March.
This means that its overall debts have risen to £16.8bn as a result of loans and fines from regulator Ofwat.
Cath Jones, Head of Company Engagement at the Consumer Council for Water, said: "It's an unsettling time for Thames Water’s customers, who have seen their bills rise significantly this year and now learn that the company has made a substantial loss in the last financial year.
“Customers need reassurance the money from their bills is going to deliver a marked improvement to the services they depend on and the environment.
“The company has made some encouraging progress in areas like leakage and water supply disruption but the rise in pollution incidents will anger and frustrate customers.
“If Thames Water is going to improve on its position as the country's least trusted water company, it must take even bigger strides towards improving its environmental performance and customer service."
In May 2025, Ofwat announced that it would fine Thames Water nearly £123m for breaches of rules relating to its wastewater operations and dividend payments.
'Fit for the future'
The water company – which serves parts of Gloucestershire, Oxfordshire, London, Berkshire, Wiltshire, Surrey, and Buckinghamshire, as well as parts of Bedfordshire, Hertfordshire, West Sussex, Kent, and Essex – has been given an allowance by Ofwat for the next five years.
Speaking to Greatest Hits Radio, Ms Jones explained: “That needs to focus on some really core services. So, it is around making sure that the sewage treatment works are fit for capacity, making sure that the pipes are big enough to transport the waste and that they don't burst all the time. But it's also around the clean water provision as well.
“So, making sure that we see less mains burst, less outages because it's a core service that people are paying for to have clean water delivered to them daily. And that does happen in most cases, and it's really great quality water, but Thames needs to invest to make sure that it's pipes and all of its treatment works are fit for the future”, she added.
“We've got a growing population, we've got a changing climate and we need to make sure that clean water gets delivered 24/7 and that wastewater gets taken away and treated effectively before it's put back into the environment.
“So, Thames will be focusing on making sure that those things are in place over the next five years, making it fit for the future.”
In the company's 2024/25 annual report, Chairman Sir Adrian Montague said: "Although it’s been a very challenging year for the business and its people, we’ve made progress in putting Thames Water on a more stable platform as we enter the next regulatory period."
CEO Chris Weston has said he is "very mindful that we are not meeting our targets in a number of important areas" and admitted it could take "at least a decade" to get the firm back to a "more stable financial foundation".
The water company also announced earlier this week that a hosepipe ban will come in next Tuesday (22 August) for people living in areas with SN, GL, OX, RG4, RG8 and RG9 postcodes.