Ovo Energy to post £37.5m loss despite customer growth

The company attracted 271,000 new customers according to the Financial Times, bringing its overall consumer figures up from 137,000 to 408,000, however, additional marketing costs, fees, licensing and staff put the company in the red.

Ovo’s founder and director, Stephen Fitzpatrick, said it would not make sense for them to focus on this year’s profit numbers as they only have a 2 per cent market share. “We have had huge growth in the scale of the business and that means paying more in costs.”

Fitzpatrick added that the company had slowed its expansion in the first nine months of the year to avoid sacrificing the quality of its customer service, which was ranked fourth in this year’s Which? customer service survey.

Ovo, one of the largest independent companies trying to puncture the dominance of the big six energy utility firms in the British energy market, also revealed they will not be following rival company First Utility in floating on the stock market.

Recent figures published by Cornwall Energy showed that 660,000 people have switched from the big six energy giants to smaller, independent services; however the big six still retain an 87 per cent market share.