Getting the bills right

In  North Carolina residents in one community want officials to figure out what's causing their water bills to spike, sometimes by hundreds of dollars.  Multiple media outlets reported Friday that customers of Charlotte Mecklenburg Utilities packed a town hall meeting in Cornelius this week.  One woman said her water and sewer bill leapt from about $25 to more than nine times that amount.  Residents say the spikes are so high they can't be explained by annual rate increases. Some have called in experts, who found no leaks in their systems or meter problems.  Utility director Doug Bean says he's committed to figuring out what's causing the high bills. Workers say equipment is working correctly at all but one of the 32 homes they visited.

And in Texas the Duncan City Council’s recent meeting focussed on an amendment to the code of ordinances relating to interference with water meters, inaccurate meter readings, prescribing penalties and prescribing procedures for adjustment due to leaks.  Historically, the city has allowed for adjustments to utility bills if a customer provided evidence that they had a leak and it was repaired. Even though the city has been allowing the adjustments, there is nothing written in the city code that says the adjustments are allowed. The city wants to amend the ordinance to allow for these adjustments and set up guidelines for the possible adjustments.
The proposed ordinance would be closely modelled after a similar one in the city of Lawton that contains specific language related to the basis of calculating adjustments with those in excess of $500 having to be submitted to the City Council for final disposition. The method and procedure outlined in this ordinance would provide a consistent and fair basis for protecting both the customer and the Public Utilities department.  Workflow in the city’s utility billing software will be needed to manage the process.

In the UK electromagnetic flow meters from ABB are playing a key role in cutting water leakage for the Ministry of Defence (MoD), with reductions of 60% achieved at some sites.   Leakage has already dropped by about 528 million (US) gallons per year across more than 1,500 MoD sites where C2C Services manages water and waste utility assets.  C2C Services is a consortium of Severn Trent Services and Costain. C2C provides water services to MoD sites in the North, East and Southeast of England, known as ‘Package C’.  The 25-year £1 billion ($1.66 billion US) contract is part of Project Aquatrine, which transferred responsibility for MoD’s water services to three different contractors.