(Reuters) - British Gas owner Centrica (L:CNA) on Monday reaffirmed its 2018 targets citing higher energy demand from colder-than-usual weather and a slowdown in net consumer customer account losses.
Net consumer customer account losses have slowed materially despite high levels of competition, Centrica said.
The company, which has been refocusing on core customer-facing energy and services business, stepped up plans for job cuts and cost savings in February after posting a 17 percent fall in 2017 operating profit.
Top energy suppliers British Gas, SSE (L:SSE), E.ON (DE:EONGn), EDF Energy (PA:EDF), Innogy's (DE:IGY) Npower and Iberdrola's (MC:IBE) Scottish Power have been facing pressure from smaller rivals offering cheaper deals.
However, Centrica said it expects customers on standard variable tariff to fall to around 3 million by the end of 2018 from the current 3.8 million. It had about 4.3 million customers at the end of 2017.
Britain said in October it would apply a temporary price cap to all standard variable tariffs in the energy market - the basic and most common form of billing - in a bid to drive down prices.
Centrica said it assumes a temporary cap will be in place by the end of 2018, adding that it continues to believe that price controls are not good for customers.
In April, the company said British Gas' standard electricity tariff would increase on May 29 by 60 pounds, largely due to rising wholesale and policy costs. British Gas raised the tariff by 12.5 percent in September despite sliding customer numbers.