Water Charges

Stompa

Colin_Kee wrote:

When I lived in England you could have a meter installed but it cost about £150+.

Water meter installation in England is free.

Colin_Kee

Stompa wrote:

Water meter installation in England is free.

Yeah Free " as long as the work is practical " Obviously ours was deemed not so. which raises the issue, what's practical & whats not??

Still same applies regarding the family situation.

Stompa

Colin_Kee wrote:

Yeah Free " as long as the work is practical " Obviously ours was deemed not so. which raises the issue, what's practical & whats not??

Good point.

According to Ofwat:

http://www.ofwat.gov.uk/aptrix/ofwat/publish.nsf/Content/infonote46

Can I be refused a meter?
Companies can refuse to install a meter where it is not practicable or is unreasonably expensive to fit one. Any disputes about this are settled by the Director.

and also:

If a company is unable to fit a meter how will I be charged?
If it is unreasonably expensive or impracticable to install a meter (and a single shared meter is not feasible) companies should offer an 'assessed charge'. Assessed charges should be a better reflection of customers' consumption than their unmeasured charges.

Companies use a number of different bases for determining assessed charges, for example:
* charges based on the type of property;
* a flat charge based on the average household bill;
* occupancy based charges; and
* charges based on an assessment of the customer's usage.

bakkah

So they are using property type as the assessed charge? Thats not a measure of consumption if they are not offering occupancy rates/discounts alongside it.

Colin_Kee

It's all a big Con... Was listening to the news last night also on Radio Ulster & I believe they have spent millions contracting out the billing to a private company. As said earlier, it's just one step further to privatisation.. I was also interested to hear the a Belfast MLA had learned that the Water Authority owns Millions of pounds worth of unused land, buildings, etc that surely shouldbe sold of to pay for these "Major" works that are being carried out. But the MLA recons they were holding on to it to make the Water Company worth more and to increase interest from Private Investors when they do get around to flogging it off.. Bloody Disgracful. What with the price of housing & land at the minute I'm sure they'd make a fortune on some of this property which could be then used to pay for these service upgrades

BigAl94

Found the site here http://www.wewontpay.tk/

andykolo

i heard the news today and was wondering has anyone seen the areas that they selected as rock bottom or there is a publication i can read about it

fwoodles

Parisien wrote:

after all to quote some famous politician, if democracy changed anything, they'd ban it!!!!!!

Is this the quote you're after?

"Red" Ken Livingston : "If voting changed anything, they'd abolish it"

(also the title of a book by him ISBN: 0002177706)
But I've niggling thought that there is another similar one out there.....

IvanOpinion

BigAl94 wrote:

Found the site here http://www.wewontpay.tk/

had a read of the site and, at best, it is not exactly painting a fair and unbiased picture. My concern about such things is that firstly the amount of revenue will be reduced, secondly whatever the new company is will be spending a lot of money in the courts (which it will have no choice to do) and therefore money that was meant to be funding the regeneration of the water and sewage infrastructure within Northern Ireland will ultimately be wasted (like has hapened to so many other initiatives).

The linked site is correct about cutting water off .. however it does not mention that any new company could cut off the sewage (which could be interesting). I have said before that if we want the services that every little action group in this community is demanding then we are paying nowhere near enough local taxation ... either we accept that we will not get the services (which ain't going to happen because every little action group is too focused on its own little 'cause' to give a damn about how much it costs) or we have to pay more. The linked site is a typical 'cause' .. and the only thing that is guaranteed with any 'cause' is that common sense has gone out the window.

The populous argument that says water charges are already built into the rates holds absolutely no merit. Lets apply simple logic (something devoid from the linked site) ... I appreiate there is a mish-mash of numbers following but it is the best I could find with a quick search ... the average council tax bill in England just tops £1000 (excludes water), in Scotland the average council tax bill seems to be about £1100 (excludes water). In Northern Ireland the average rates bill under the new scheme will be around about £656 (although this looks a bit low to me). If we look at the average water bill for one region of the UK (could be expensive or cheap, I don't know) then it is £449 per annum - but for the sake of argument lets take it as being £360 per annum (similar to what we are expected to be charged). Using these figures then that means we are paying the equivalent of not much more than £300 for all other local services compared to £1000 on the mainland. By the way I also appreciate the difference between councils in Northern Ireland and councils elsewhere in the UK, therefore in Northern Ireland we have to consider funding for those non council offices that would come under control of the councils on the mainland.

For the system to be fair though they need to meter it. I will pay, but I will only pay a portion based on the fact that there are only two of us versus every other neighbour in the street that has between 4 and 6 people living in the house. Therefore I will not pay any more than 50-66% of what they are paying. I have already paid for water reduction features to be fitted to my house (in anticipation of this). I don't want to pay any more taxation but I do want good services ... you can't have one without the other.

ivan

Colin_Kee

Good point from IvanOpinion!! I do agree that we have to pay in some way for our water but in many ways the Government have made a complete pigs ear of the manner in which they've brought/bringing the system in. Seems they're trying to use it, as they did with the domestic rates issue, as another form of whipping stick to get our MP's into Stormont. Sorry but I don't want these issues which affect my day to day living to be played about with in this manner. I heard on the radio news this morning some UK Minister say that actually our Rates at the moment don't have any money from them allocated to the Water Service and haven't had since 1999. So where's the money been comming from for the Water Service?? Why has this fact not been made common knowledge, or has it?? It seems no-one really knows the whole story of what's going on. As Ivan has commented, I too don't mind paying my "FAIR" share for my water & Sewage or rates for that matter, but not for what I don't use. I would agree that they have to allow people to have meters installed if requested. Like the whole rates polava. why should the size or value of someones house determin their rates or water bills, It has no link at all to the water or services you use. You should be able to pay for what you get,

On the issue of rates in England, Scotland & Wales.

Some points to bear in mind!!
In GB in general most of the Services are Privatised:- Water, Waste, Bin Services, Street Cleaning, the list goes on, you name it it's privatised. I wander if this is why therates are so high??

House prices & wages in GB are usually higher than Northern Ireland so this would also have an effect on the rates as staff wages are more and due to the way the rates system is set up (House Value) they will have higher rates returns.