Water meters - pros and cons? 24 September 2004 at 12:33AM edited 30 November -1 at 12:00AM in Water Bills 590 replies 361K views

scazmissie

If you get a standard rv bill and look at how it is set the fixed charges are included in the total charge they include the swd the highway and foul water fixed charge along with your water and your wasted fixed charge totaling 63 pounds per year.

chrisfr

scootermacc wrote: »

Does anyone have any experience or advice on whether gettnig a water meter might save money or not?

I have a natural reluctance against the idea in case my billis astronomical, but this is emotion not fact.

Anyone help?

As our 6 person household has gradually reduced down to 2, we've recently had a meter fitted. We have separate water and sewage companies, and our initial bills suggest we will save over £350 this year.
I expected to save, but didn't realise it would be this much.
Even my mother-in-law, living on her own, is predicted to save.

Make sure you ask your water company for advice first.

Hope this helps,

Chris

jeferey

chrisfr wrote: »

As our 6 person household has gradually reduced down to 2, we've recently had a meter fitted. We have separate water and sewage companies, and our initial bills suggest we will save over £350 this year.
I expected to save, but didn't realise it would be this much.
Even my mother-in-law, living on her own, is predicted to save.

Make sure you ask your water company for advice first.

Hope this helps,

Chris

I asked our Severn Trent if we would save money and they said no. I went ahead and got a meter anyway and we saved over £100 in the first year and we have 5 people in a 4 bedroom house

Cardew

This subject should really be a 'Sticky'.

There is absolutely no point in people posting on here that meters are cheaper, or meters are more expensive. There is no rule of thumb either e.g more bedrooms than people and a meter is cheaper.

The two essential factors to consider are the Rateable Value(RV) of your property and how much water you use; and the latter consumption is generally determined by the number of people in the household.

Knowing the RV of your property you can easily determine your annual bill by looking at the water company's website.

To estimate the amount of water you use, take a figure of 50 to 60 cubic metres a year per person, and look up the cost of that consumption on the company website. 50-60 cubic metres is the UK average and you can modify that figure according to how careful(or not) you are with water usage.

jeferey

Yes Cardew it is an average but some people must use loads! We used 120 cubic metres in first year and we have 5 people - average 24 each.

purple_oldie

My daughter lives alone and has proved that in her case it is MUCH cheaper to have a water meter.

karenelainehughes

Swany247 wrote: »

Hi! We changed over to a water meter after everyone persuaded us it was in our best interest and we would make considerable savings. There's only 2 of us in the house, we spend at least 8 weeks out of the UK and we don't have a dish washer. We have a smallish garden with a greenhouse but I have two large water barrels that I use most of the year (if it's particularly dry I do use the hose pipe occasionally). I do set up a watering system for the greenhouse for a couple of weeks of the year but I only have a few plants in there). After one year of being on the meter our bills have doubled! We are told that we are excessive users of a family of 4 or more! Everything has been checked and we have no leaks inside our property. If we go back to the rating system our bills will be £45 per month but we will have to pay the meter debt off of £225 before we can do this! Yorkshire Water have checked their pipework and say the fault is at our side of the meter. We've had it checked and it isn't. We were advised that our water consumption on a meter would calculate at approx £25 per month but it has worked out at least double and now we will have to pay the debit off too. Our only option is to have the blooming meter taken out and we will be free to use whatever water we want to use in excess. The water department are not concerned at all about where all this water is going to so neither am I. Sorry if this sounds very negative but I am extremely angry but in some way I hope this helps you make an informed decision.

The above applies to us almost exactly, 2 people living in 4 bedroomed house, used to pay £54 a month x 9, so £486, just about to have our meter removed having accumulated an annual bill of over £650. We don't have a dishwasher or any sprinkler system in the garden, have a daily shower each, 3/4 loads of washing a week, live in Wales so watering the garden (especially last Summer) is very very rarely done, work 5 days a week so out the house from 7.30 to 6, spend 6 weeks out of the UK a year.... I was told by Severn Trent when I started querying the bills that we had consumption equivalent to 5/6 people living in the house ... I haven't the faintest idea why? We've had the flow test done, Severn Trent say there are no problems with the meter (fitted into kitchen wall) and we are not aware of leaks within the house... surely if there are any we'd have spotted evidence of them? I dread to think how much a family of 4/5 people would have had to spend on their water in this house... for us it's definately a big NO

Cardew

karenelainehughes wrote: »

The above applies to us almost exactly, 2 people living in 4 bedroomed house, used to pay £54 a month x 9, so £486, just about to have our meter removed having accumulated an annual bill of over £650. We don't have a dishwasher or any sprinkler system in the garden, have a daily shower each, 3/4 loads of washing a week, live in Wales so watering the garden (especially last Summer) is very very rarely done, work 5 days a week so out the house from 7.30 to 6, spend 6 weeks out of the UK a year.... I was told by Severn Trent when I started querying the bills that we had consumption equivalent to 5/6 people living in the house ... I haven't the faintest idea why? We've had the flow test done, Severn Trent say there are no problems with the meter (fitted into kitchen wall) and we are not aware of leaks within the house... surely if there are any we'd have spotted evidence of them? I dread to think how much a family of 4/5 people would have had to spend on their water in this house... for us it's definately a big NO

An annual metered bill of £650 with Severn Trent equates to an annual water consumption of around 280 to 300 cubic metres.

The average in UK is around 60 cubic metres per person - so 120 for a couple and a bill of approx £300; as ST say you are using what would be expected of a 5 or 6 person household.

There is something very wrong if you use that amount on your declared usage. Could you have a faulty cistern? overflowing into toilet bowl.

Gothicfairy

Have you kept an eye on the readings ? As Cardew has said, it is a really high bill and if STW are saying the meter is fine then the next step would be to keep an eye on the consumption and trying to see when it is being used.

mlp

Re: high consumption - if you have one of these new toilet cisterns with a push button flush it is important to realise that the only thing stopping water seeping/leaking out and down into the bowl is a rubber seal. If that is starting to perish, or isn't sitting properly due to debris then you will be constantly leaking water.

Compare this with ye olde fashioned syphonic cistern where you have to yank a lever in order to cause enough pressure to start syphoning the water out of the cistern - very unlikely to leak water in the same way.