Financial highlights (prior year numbers restated where applicable):
Revenue up 10.8% to £294.0m (2014: £265.5m)
Adjusted profit before tax up 10.1% to £22.5m (2014: £20.4m); statutory £15.2m (2014: £14.5m)
Adjusted earnings per share up 11% to 23.2p (2014: 20.9p); statutory 14.3p (2014: 13.5p)
Interim dividend increased by 15.8% to 22p per share (2014: 19p)
Operating highlights:
Further organic growth in line with previous guidance
Total services supplied up by 53,488 for the period to 2,146,935 (2014: 2,012,052)
Customer ("Member") numbers for the period up by 13,585 to 595,098 (2014: 559,449)
Recommended Provider and Best Buy Awards received from Which? and Moneywise
Commenting on today's results, Andrew Lindsay, Chief Executive, said:
"I am pleased with the profitable growth of the business during the first half of the year, in the face of continuing strong headwinds. We now supply over 2.1 million services to around 600,000 Members throughout the country."
"We continue to build market share in each of the services we supply through our unique combination of personal recommendation, the convenience of a genuine multi-utility proposition, consistently high standards of customer service, and a commitment to treating our Members fairly. As a result, we remain confident that we will achieve our target of supplying a million households over the medium term."
"We recently launched a new benefit for owner-occupiers who switch all their services to us, offering to supply and fit low energy LED light bulbs in their homes for free; this is expected to reduce their electricity consumption by over 10% into perpetuity, and has already resulted in a significant improvement in the quality of new Members joining us over the last six weeks."
"We remain on track to deliver record revenues, profits, and earnings per share for the current financial year. This is reflected in the 15.8% increase in our interim dividend, and our intention to pay a total dividend of 46p for the full year."
