I have been told that wpd do not like outside contractors. They have already stopped The Freedom Group doing o/h design work and will look to stop external wayleave work with Freedom.
They are establishing more local offices, working within a short radius of these, doing all new connections and o/h line rebuilds up to 11kv. To include wayleave officers, Project Managers, Linesmen, tree cutters all out of the local depot. (Northampton/MK/Kettering/Leicester Nth/Hinckley etc)
Most people believe that relatively small wpd from Somerset/Cornwall have taken on too much and did not realise the size of the task they have taken on (Birmingham alone is the size of all their kit in the South West).
They are cutting, cutting, cutting people and work accross the board - a bit like the Chinies have done (UKPN) have done in the South East with EDF.
They are going to do the absolute minimum accross all the network/assets and try to stop customer complaints at all costs.
Story is that if someone looks like complaining they just throw money at them!!
Wpd had a job where 10 terraced houses needed new u/g service cables to replace existing o/h services.
wpd paid each household