Where do I/We stand ? Help !

tycumagain

Hope one of you more legaly knowledgeable folk could help...
I have just moved into a block of 12 flats, 1-6 ground 6-12 first floor, but I have discovered that "all" the water meters have been put in the wrong way round so to speak. IE; flat 1 is reading flat 12 water usage & so on! As far as I am aware this as been the case since the flats were built some 7 years ago !
Where would all the residents stand re; over/under payments over all that time ? Hope someone can point us in the right direction !
Thanks in advance !

BackOnTrack

Who told you that they had been put in the wrong way round and have you spoken to the water company about it?

Cardew

Happens lots of times.

Water company will state(with justification) it is the developer/builder's fault.

In theory it should just be a simple case of refunds and extra charges to those affected. However presumably there have been occupants moving in and out during that time.

Your best bet is to put the problem to the water company and get their solution. In other cases they have refunded those overcharged and written off sums for those undercharged as a goodwill measure - and because it is a nightmare to unravel such a situation.

If you are unhappy with their proposed solution - then take the matter to the Consumer Council for water.

Gothicfairy

It might also be a case of getting it all right now and just starting again from then..IE everyone calls it a wash, any over payment is lost but so it any underpayment.
The water company would probably not have installed the meters so they would have been using the builders info so there might be a case to go back to them but that would need to be checked by a solicitor etc

The first thing that needs to happen though is that the meters now get assigned to the correct address and I guess the water company are coming to do that with a flow test, so have you had an appointment for that yet ?

BackOnTrack

Something doesn't seem right about this. They've been connected wrongly for seven years and nobody has bothered getting it sorted out? Misconnections do happen but once they are known about they are usually resolved.

tycumagain

Thanks for the quick response folks.
Just got off phone to United Utillities & they say it could take up to 2 months to sort out !
As I'm new to the building shouldnt affect me too much, just dont wont anybody else to get slapped with a huge bill :eek:
Would be a bit miffed if I had lived here alone for all those years with a family of four's water bills though !
Only dicovered it as wanted to read my meter so as not to get last occupants water slapped onto my bill & found my meter number didn't match the one it should have been & upon searching found it outside another flat. Also found a copy of original plan for my flat & it is down as the number my meters outside...Not the number on my door !! Confused ?

Gothicfairy

True.
I would think they would at least have an appointment time for a flow test. But then we don't yet know why or how they have come aware of this or if the water company even know about the problem.
The OP is online so with any luck we will get more info and then be able to offer some advice.

Gothicfairy

okay..My answer has been dealt with ...lol

treasuretiger

BackOnTrack wrote: »

Something doesn't seem right about this. They've been connected wrongly for seven years and nobody has bothered getting it sorted out? Misconnections do happen but once they are known about they are usually resolved.

some people will just pay their bills and not question! then no one will pipe up until a family of 8 or something move in and some single guy gets the charges! i know lots of people that dont thoroughly check their bills .

JR87

this is a major problem within UU when it comes to flats, primarily caused by the builders submitting plans and then altering them afterwards. UU employ a company H2O to fit there water meters to the pipes in the plans submitted for each property and then send the service orders orders back to UU with meter serial numbers for each seperate flat.

to figure out that all the meters are crossed im guessing a service order will have already been done which leads to the next step a special project

the special project is designed to find out which meters supply which flats so they can all be updated onto the correct accounts. this is were it gets tricky, the actually job is about 30 mins, the hardest part is getting in touch with all the occupiers involved and if any of the flats are unoccupied it can make it even harder. some special projects can take upto a year.

once all this has been done and confirm all the readings are there to be used so if u have over paid u will be reimbursed, if u have underpaid u will be charged back to a maximum of 3 years (statute to limitations). this is however only for current tenants, if any previous tenants want to chase it up they will have to contact UU, very rare UU get in touch with them, usualy just written off whether in arrears or credit as takes too long to work it all out.