LONDON/DUESSELDORF, March 6 (Reuters) – Germany’s second-largest utility, RWE, plans to cut about 2,500 jobs at npower, a source close to the matter said, as it confronts customer losses and billing issues at its struggling British subsidiary.
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Sky said the proposals were still being finalised but cuts would be made both among npower’s directly employed workforce, at internal suppliers elsewhere in RWE and at outsourcing partners.
The company, owned by the German powerhouse RWE, employs 7,500 people directly and a further 4,000 indirectly in Britain and is one of the “Big Six” gas and electricity suppliers in the UK.
Npower’s retail arm last November reported a £48 million ($68.3 million, 62 million euro) loss in the first nine months of the year, down from a £73 million profit a year earlier.
The firm, which generates power as well as supplying it, has been hit by tumbling oil and gas prices.
Npower has major plants in the United Kingdom including Pembroke and Aberthaw in Wales and Staythorpe in Nottinghamshire.
Npower’s operations support about 11,500 jobs across the United Kingdom and should these job cuts go ahead, that equates to a reduction of 20% of the workforce.
Unite union national officer Kevin Coyne said: “It is an inexcusable way for the company to treat a loyal workforce which has worked hard to turn npower’s record on customer service around in the previous year”.
The news comes days before the Competition and Markets Authority is to report on the latest stage of its investigation into the energy market.
Morale among the workforce is “already at rock bottom”, according to union representatives, after the firm’s poor performance in recent months.
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The company declined to comment on the reports.
