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Telecom Plus shares rose about 4% on Tuesday, October 6, after the owner of Utility Warehouse reported that multiservice customer growth exceeded its full-year target in the first half and kept its adjusted pretax profit forecast unchanged. The company said multiservice organic customer numbers reached approximately 526,000 in the six months to September 30, growing at an annualised rate above 11%.
The update offered shareholders an early measure of progress on the five-year plan Telecom Plus announced in June. For the financial year ending March 2027, the group continues to expect adjusted pretax profit of £80 million to £90 million, while cautioning that profit is expected to be weighted heavily toward the second half.
Multiservice growth moves ahead of target
Multiservice customers increased from about 498,000 at the end of fiscal 2026 to roughly 526,000 at September’s close. Telecom Plus said that growth rate was ahead of its target of more than 10% for the full year and around three times the pace recorded in fiscal 2026.
Single-service organic customers also grew, rising at an annualised rate of about 8.5% to approximately 791,000, from 759,000 at the previous financial year-end. Taken together, total organic customers reached about 1.32 million, up from 1.26 million and representing annualised growth of approximately 9.7%.
The figures cover organic customers and do not include any separately identified acquired customer additions in the update. The company has described its business as a subscription platform spanning household energy, broadband, mobile and insurance, with customers able to take multiple services through one provider.
Partner network and cross-selling expand
Telecom Plus attributed part of the momentum to its Partner distribution network. Average monthly active Partners rose about 15% in the first half to approximately 4,900, compared with around 4,200 in the second half of fiscal 2026. Total Partner numbers exceeded 88,000 at September’s end, up from about 77,000 at the prior year-end.
At a September sales conference in Birmingham, which the company said drew a record 6,000 Partners, it introduced an unlimited mobile offer, changes to multiservice customer incentives and a Partner share-option scheme. The scheme offers a one-million-share options pool linked to sustained activity through June 2030, according to the company announcement.
The group’s in-life cross-selling programme added about 25,000 core services during the half. That leaves it on track, it said, for a fiscal 2027 target of 50,000 additional core services sold to existing customers. Insurance services also returned to modest growth, reaching approximately 114,000 from 113,000 at the end of fiscal 2026; a motor insurance launch is planned for the second half.
Profit guidance unchanged, with earnings weighted to H2
The company maintained its adjusted pretax profit forecast of £80 million to £90 million for fiscal 2027. It expects approximately 15% of full-year adjusted pretax profit to be generated in the first half and 85% in the second, a phasing that makes the November results and subsequent trading important checkpoints for investors.
Telecom Plus also reiterated its expectation that year-end net debt to adjusted EBITDA will be around 1.5 times in fiscal 2027, before declining to around 1.0 times over the five-year plan. Those are company targets rather than reported outcomes for the half year; the trading update did not provide first-half profit or debt figures.
The plan’s stated longer-term ambition is adjusted pretax profit of £175 million by fiscal 2031. The company said it is investing in its customer proposition, brand awareness, digitalisation and additional growth opportunities. Its trading statement said automated journeys were handling a growing proportion of customer interactions, but gave no quantified financial contribution from that programme.
Buyback progress and next reporting date
As of October 2, Telecom Plus had bought back approximately 3.8 million shares under its £40 million programme at an average price of 821.24 pence per share, with about £9 million remaining to deploy. The company expects total shareholder distributions in fiscal 2027 to be weighted toward the second half, with an indicative 40% interim and 60% final split.
The company said that, at current share-price levels, half of those distributions would be through an extension of the buyback programme and the rest through dividends. That description reflects the company’s stated expectation in the trading update, not a final distribution decision.
Telecom Plus is scheduled to publish its first-half results on November 24, 2026. Those results are expected to provide fuller financial detail for the six months ended September 30; until then, the company has confirmed its annual guidance but has not released first-half profit figures.
