South West Water sewerage charge

dlake0001

Just looking for a few opinions/ comparisons/ ideas from people if that's okay. My retired parents live in a 3 bedroom council house with my sister who is incapable of looking after herself and they have just received their water bill estimate for the coming year. It is over £1200 with sewearge charges making up over £750 alone. Mine, in comparison, is about £500 in total with sewerage charges of £150. Does anyone else pay charges remotely similar to this? Does anyone else think they are being royally ripped off? If so, does anyone know any way of getting this checked out? I don't want to enquire on their behalf and end up increasing their bill! Thanks in advance.

macman

SWW charges are up to 250% higher than elsewhere in the UK. However they will be getting the £50 govt-funded discount this year, applied as £25 every 6m. This will continue until 2020. And a tariff freeze until 4/15 has just been announced.
Are they on metered or RV billing? If the latter, why don't they switch to a meter?
If on RV billing they're not being 'ripped off'. SWW have to bill according to the RV, they have no discretion to bill any other way.

Cardew

As said above, their main problem is they live in the South West.


If they have received the 2014/15 bill now it is probably a bill based on the Rateable Value(RV). If so the bill will give the RV as £xxx.


You can check if they are paying for Surface Water Drainage(SWD) and if none of their surface water(gutters etc) enters the sewer they can claim relief from that charge.


The average metered consumption for 3 people is between 150 to 165 cubic metres pa.


That would cost approx £900 to £985 and if they can claim relief from SWD about £70 less than those figures. See:


http://www.southwestwater.co.uk/media/pdf/s/m/Charges_scheme_2013_-_2014.pdf


It is worth noting that many people can use far less than the 50-55 cubic metres per person per year.


In any case if you elect to pay by meter, you have 12 months to revert back to charges based on the RV.

dlake0001

Thanks guys. I only live a mile or so from them which was why I asked. Maybe it is because they're not on a meter. I think I'll recommend they try one and if they're not happy switch back before the end of the 12 months. Didn't realise you could do that. Thanks for your help.