The cost-of-living crisis is one of the topics that Northumbrian Water will be exploring at its Innovation Festival next month, as well as looking for ways to make its services even better for customers.
The seventh Innovation Festival, held between 10th and 13th July at Newcastle Racecourse, will see participants looking for new ideas and solutions to challenges faced by the water sector and beyond, through a series of sprints, hacks, and dashes.
Under the theme of ‘Customer Heroes’, are nine ‘sprints’ - workshop-style sessions which follow a five-stage process – to improve services for customers by using collaborative analytics and data science.
One of the sprints will focus on how it can make it easier for households to find out which money saving schemes they’re entitled to, such as reduced bills, grants and energy saving products, and how they can access these savings quickly and simply.
Another will look at transforming everyday household cleaning tasks, such as laundry and dishwashing, to make them more effective while consuming less water and less energy – allowing customers to save money and the planet at the same time.
Meanwhile, some festival-goers will explore how social housing tenants can be supported more effectively, uncovering new technology, education and engagement to help banish damp and mould from tenants’ homes.
Northumbrian Water will be collaborating with some industry-leading experts from huge organisations, who will be leading the way for the Customer Heroes sprints. They include P&G, Believe Housing, Wave, Cognizant, Kraken, Southern Water, RSPB, WWF, National Trust, Royal College of Art and Shout Digital.
Angela MacOscar, Head of Innovation at Northumbrian Water, said: “Our customers are at the heart of everything we do here at Northumbrian Water, so every year we make sure that our Innovation Festival focuses on topics that are important to our customers, or can make their lives easier in some way.
“All of the events taking place at the festival will relate to our customers, but these ones specifically included in the Customer Heroes bubble will directly impact the people in our region.
“We’ll be bringing together creative minds and cutting-edge technologies to look for ways to support and improve our customers' experiences and we can’t wait to get started.”
For more details about the Northumbrian Water Innovation Festival, and to register for a sprint, go to www.innovationfestival.org