NORTH West Water has been taken to task for offering a "poor" telephone service to customers.

Industry regulator Ofwat criticised the company for not responding quickly enough to telephone complaints and queries.

But the watchdog praised the water firm overall for "serving its customers and the environment well".

A North West Water spokesman defended the company's record, claiming its telephone service had performed only slightly below the average.

The spokesman added: "We are always looking at ways to improve customer services.

"If we get a busy period, then there are not enough people to answer the phone but we strive to answer them within given periods.

"We would hope to have improved by the time the next figures come out in the middle of next year."

Ofwat has launched a report into the levels of service for water industries in England and Wales.

Bosses of the big water firms have received a copy of the report in a bid to keep standards high.

Some of the good points included:

Despite a seven per cent increase in the number of billing contacts, more than 97pc were answered within five working days;

The number of written complaints to companies fell slightly by 0.5pc to 153,600 over the previous year;

Almost 99pc of written complaints were answered within 10 working days, a significant increase on last year;

Despite a 20pc increase in the number of metered accounts, the number of customers billed during the year, based on a company's or customer's meter reading, increased for the fourth successive year to 99.7pc.

Eleven companies reported that they had read all of their meters during the past two years;

More than 84pc of calls received by companies were answered within 15 seconds, with more than 90pc answered within 30 seconds. This compares with 74pc and 81pc respectively last year.

However, the number of payments made for inadequate service to customers rose from 19,500 to 20,800, largely reflecting failures to connect customers in time. Almost £1.5 million was paid in compensation.

The Environmental Agency considers there is still room for improvement in the environmental performance standards, which had nevertheless shown gains.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.