Anyone on a water meter?

[Piggywinkle]

Moved into a metered property a few weeks ago. They're completely new to me.

Found out where it is, but it's about 8 feet down so there is absolutely no chance of me reading it

Didn't help that the water company recorded our new address incorrectly, so instead of sending someone out to read our meter, they read someone else's So here we are, a fortnight later, and they reckon they are sending someone out to read our meter (I only asked them a week ago, when we had our first letter with the wrong address on...)

Is anyone else in the same position? What do you do when you can't read your own water meter? I'd rather not have estimated bills just to find out that we've been underpaying for a year at the end of our first 12 months. Water company have said that there is a charge for someone to come out and read the meter, but what they didn't mention is that they would send out engineers to the wrong address and then leave a delay when I request for one to be sent to the right address!

I give up

 

[Rachel_C]

We had to have a meter put in when we moved (local policy) but we've never read it and we've been here 19 months. I've checked with OH and he hasn't read it either but our bills aren't estimated so somebody is reading it!

Does your water company definitely not read it normally? Could it be that they only charge if you request an extra meter reading but will normally do it free of charge according to their schedule? You should be able to make them do your reading free now as it was their mistake. Can you talk to your neighbours about whether they normally read their own meters?

 

[Piggywinkle]

We had to have a meter put in when we moved (local policy) but we've never read it and we've been here 19 months. I've checked with OH and he hasn't read it either but our bills aren't estimated so somebody is reading it!

Does your water company definitely not read it normally? Could it be that they only charge if you request an extra meter reading but will normally do it free of charge according to their schedule? You should be able to make them do your reading free now as it was their mistake. Can you talk to your neighbours about whether they normally read their own meters?

Apparently, they only read it once every 12 months and then either estimate it to take the customer's reading for the rest of the year. I'm just scared that we're going to end up with a big whopping underpayment at the end of the year.

I haven't really spoken to the neighbours yet, but that's another story!