United utilities meter not working?

CG77

Hi all,

I'm totally and utterly clueless as to how all this works, so am looking for some advice please.

We (myself, hubby and 3 yr old) moved into our house 16 months ago and have been paying £31 per month for water to United Utilities. Since July we have not been paying anything as our statement showed we were in credit. Yesterday we called and asked where we were up to with the bills and when we would need to start paying again. We were informed we were in credit by £215 and could have that money credited back and then begin paying again by DD. Of course with Christmas round the corned we thought this would be a good idea. We were asked for a meter reading. Eventually we found the meter (under 2 ft of water in a little hole on the pavement outside) and it read 11. The lady from United Utilities said she'll refund our money but that it looks like our meter's not working as it was 11 in Jan of last year!! :eek:

Our worry now is what will happen? The lady said a new meter will be installed and they'll monitor our usage and then bill us back to when we moved in! :eek:

Are we likely to be looking at a huge bill?? Is £31 a month 'normalish' for a household of 2 and a little one (we do use the washing machine daily at least once and all shower each day-little one has a bath instead of a shower 3 times a week or so)?

Of course we'll keep the £215 refund to one side now we know this but are we likely to be hit with a bill even bigger than that??

Sorry if I'm asking ridiculous questions but as I said I really have NO clue about this!

Thanks!!

CG. x

Cardew

CG77 wrote: »

Are we likely to be looking at a huge bill?? Is £31 a month 'normalish' for a household of 2 and a little one (we do use the washing machine daily at least once and all shower each day-little one has a bath instead of a shower 3 times a week or so)?

Yes £31 would be 'normalish' for a family of 3. Perhaps a little on the high side.

When they fit a meter, make sure you are frugal with water during the monitoring period. The usage during that period will determine your back charges.

Flushing toilets is a major element in water consumption.

CG77

Thanks Cardew,

Since your post I've filled in the CCW water calculator and it seems to be saying our bill (for water and sewerage) should be over £700 per year for the 3 of us! :eek:

Can that be right?? I'm really worrying now we're going to be hit with a huge bill that we can't afford to pay!

Thanks so much in advance.

CG. x

Cardew

For a family of 3 the average consumption should be 180 cubic metres per year.

That will cost approx £480.

However many people manage to get their consumption well below 60 cubic metres per person per year.

CG77

Thank you again. Do you have any idea what would happen if we did get a large bill back-dated over the time we've lived here, which we are unable to pay? At the end of the day the meter is faulty and had it not been, we would have happily paid a larger amount in installments. We only found out the problem with the meter because we phoned them to see what was going on! It seems really annoying we could be left with a large bill because their meter is faulty and hasn't been identified earlier.

Thanks so much for your help with this!

CG. x

Cardew

Well you have plenty of time.

First they have to fit a meter.

Then they have to monitor your consumption over a period of some time, which might be several weeks. (as said before - be sparing with your water usage over this period)

When you get a bill you can start to negotiate!! If you apply to pay by Direct Debit they may spread whatever you owe over the next few months.

As the footballers say, take it one game at a time.

bluewire

I would be surprised if they give you the refund when they know that a bill will be coming at some point.

They have a policy that they will only refund an account when it is correctly billed up (which is going to be after you have had a meter change)

In regards to how long you will have to pay (Cardew is correct) and they should if requested spread out the payments to catch up (they generally allow the same amount of time that you have not been billed correctly on a "back average"

For the back average (again Cardew is correct) ensure that you are as careful with the water as possible. They will ask you for meter reads a set time after the meter is installed (usually 2 months is good enough)

Make sure that you re-start your payments now though to help you balance the charges as best as possible for you.