Job Description:

Thames Water is recruiting a Standard Collections Service Delivery Manager to join our Financial Customer Care team, someone who brings confident operational leadership, a strong customer focus, and a passion for driving results.

In this role, you’ll take the lead on a large and varied team working across both our internal operations and UK‑based delivery partners. You’ll be at the centre of ensuring our collections activity runs smoothly, efficiently, and with fairness at its core. Your work will shape how customers experience our collections journey, ensuring it’s clear, supportive and effective.

As Thames Water continues to transform, this is a chance to play an important role in how we evolve, influencing strategy, improving processes, and helping us build a service that works brilliantly for both our customers and our people.

What you’ll be doing as our Standard Collection Service Delivery Manager

• Leading and inspiring a large multi‑site team, driving high performance, colleague engagement, and excellent customer outcomes.
• Overseeing all Standard Collections operational processes and KPIs, ensuring performance meets business needs.
• Acting as the operational lead for change delivery, embedding new ways of working and supporting business transformation.
• Identifying gaps and opportunities across collections processes to influence improvements to future strategy.
• Driving continuous improvement to make interactions easier for both customers and colleagues.
• Collaborating closely with senior stakeholders across Finance, Customer Services, Customer Experience, Digital, Credit Risk, and other key areas.
• Building strong relationships with external partners to ensure service delivery meets expectations.
• Ensuring governance, documentation, and regulatory adherence for all collections processes.
• Understanding and meeting data and reporting needs for operational insight and decision‑making.
• Identifying risks, ensuring they are documented, controlled, and mitigated effectively.

What you should bring to the role

• Strong, confident leadership experience within a large, diverse operational environment.
• Proven ability to motivate teams, drive performance, and maintain high engagement.
• Experience in collections, customer operations, or similar performance‑driven environments 
• Excellent stakeholder management skills, with experience influencing and collaborating across multiple business areas.
• Strong change management and transformation experience — comfortable navigating a dynamic and evolving environment.
• Solid financial acumen and understanding of operational performance management.
• A continuous improvement mindset with the ability to identify opportunities and implement positive change.
• Ability to interpret data, understand reporting needs, and make informed decisions.
• Strong organisational, governance, and process‑management skills.
• A commitment to delivering fair customer outcomes and supporting colleagues to thrive.

Location: Hybrid - Walnut Court - SN2 8BN (2 days in the office per week)
Hours: 36 hours per week

What’s in it for you?

• Competitive salary: £55,000–£60,000 per annum, depending on skills and experience.
• Car allowance
• Annual bonus
• 26 days of holiday, rising to 30 with service (plus bank holidays)
• Private medical healthcare
• Performance-related pay plan linked to company targets
• 2A wide range of benefits supporting your health, wellbeing, and finances including annual health MOTs, physiotherapy, counselling, Cycle to Work schemes, shopping vouchers, and life assurance

Find out more about our benefits and perks (Please note different T&Cs apply if on secondment)

Who are we?
We’re the UK’s largest water and wastewater company, with more than 16 million customers relying on us every day to supply water for their taps and toilets. We want to build a better future for all, helping our customers, communities, people, and the planet to thrive. It’s a big job and we’ve got a long way to go, so we need help from passionate and skilled people, committed to making a difference and getting us to where we want to be in the years and decades to come.

Learn more about our purpose and values

Working at Thames Water
Thames Water is a unique, rewarding, and diverse place to work, where every day you can make a difference, yet no day is the same. As part of our family, you’ll enjoy meaningful career opportunities, flexible working arrangements and excellent benefits.

If you’re looking for a sustainable and successful career where you can make a daily difference to millions of people’s lives while helping to protect the world of water for future generations, we’ll be here to support you every step of the way. Together, we can build a better future for our customers, our region, and our planet.

Real purpose, real support, real opportunities. Come and join the Thames Water family. Why choose us? Learn more.

We’re committed to being a great, diverse, and inclusive place to work. We welcome applications from everyone and want to ensure you feel supported throughout the recruitment process. If you need any adjustments, whether that’s extra time, accessible formats, or anything else just let us know, we’re here to help and support.

When a crisis happens, we all rally around to support our customers. As part of Team Thames, you’ll have the opportunity to sign up to support our customers on the frontline as an ambassador. Full training will be given for what is undoubtedly an incredibly rewarding experience. It’s also a great opportunity to learn more about our business and meet colleagues.

Disclaimer: due to the high volume of applications we receive, we may close the advert earlier than the advertised date, so we encourage you to apply as soon as possible to avoid disappointment.