17th Nov 2015 08:37
LONDON (Alliance News) - Homeserve PLC on Tuesday said it made a good start to its financial year, as the plumbing, heating and electrical repairs company saw its customer numbers reach 6.6 million in the first half of its financial year.
The increase in Homeserve's customer numbers puts it ahead of the 5.9 million recorded at the end of the first half the prior year, and means that more than two-thirds of its customers are outside the UK.
Pretax profit fell to GBP21.3 million in the six months to September 30, compared with GBP25.3 million the corresponding half the prior year, and Homeserve increased its dividend per share to 3.80 pence from 3.63p. Homeserve said the prior year's pretax profit benefited from GBP4.6 million of exceptional income.
Revenue rose to GBP262.3 million from GBP241.7 million, while operating costs grew to GBP239.4 million from GBP214.9 million.
"In addition to delivering good customer service, the UK business has increased gas service delivery capability with the recent acquisition of a heating business based in Nottingham with over 150 gas engineers. We are also delighted that our new partnership with Lyonnaise des Eaux in France has had a strong start. In the USA, customer numbers are up 24% and we continue to see excellent growth prospects as we signed a further six new partners, now serving 31m households. We remain confident in our expectations of good growth for the full year," Chief Executive Richard Harpin said in a statement.
Shares in Homeserve were up 0.5% at 421.70p on Tuesday morning.
By Samuel Agini; [email protected]; @samuelagini
Copyright 2015 Alliance News Limited. All Rights Reserved.
Related Shares:
HSV.L