Ovo responds to energy crisis with move to cut quarter of workforce

Ovo Energy, the UK’s third-biggest gas and electricity supplier, is to cut a quarter of its workforce as part of a restructuring aimed at saving costs amid the deepening industry crisis.

Sky News has learnt that Ovo could announce details of its plans as soon as Thursday, with roughly 1,700 out of 6,200 roles expected to be lost as part of a voluntary redundancy programme.

The announcement will come during a difficult week for the company, which provoked anger when it sent an apparently light-hearted email to customers this week recommending that they perform star-jumps or cuddle their pet to keep warm during the winter months.

Stephen Fitzpatrick, Ovo’s founder and chief executive, was nevertheless praised on social media for the sincerity of an apology he made for the communication.

One source said Ovo’s announcement of the redundancy programme would be accompanied by a commitment to increase minimum pay across the company to £12-an-hour, and to ‘reshore’ all customer-facing jobs to the UK.

It also plans to open a new academy in Glasgow, and to close a number of its sites as part of a consolidation to three locations in London, Bristol and Glasgow.

Ovo has grown from scratch since it was set up by Mr Fitzpatrick in 2009, but was transformed by the acquisition of SSE’s retail customer base two years ago.

Since the SSE acquisition, Ovo’s integration plan has accelerated, and it is now migrating 120,000 customers each week to its own automated operating platform.

Ovo’s greater automation means it requires fewer staff to run it, according to one industry insider.