A client named Paul called me from his home in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware and asked why I thought his quarterly water bill had skyrocketed above $1,400.   Before I began to answer Paul’s question, I checked with him to see if there had been any unusual usage situations – broken pipes, yard soaking, filling the pool, and so on.  Paul had been gardening a lot and planted lots of flowers and small trees that he soaked for hours at a time.  Finally, I asked Paul to read me the information off his water bill.   

As I suspected, he was being charged for each gallon of water being used anywhere on his property as if it had gone through the sewer system.  Most people are unaware that utility companies do not measure sewer usage except by the number of gallons used by the property.  The typical bill will give the owner one rate for the water and a separate and higher rate for the sewer for the same amount of water.  Paul was hot.  He screamed that he was not flushing his toilet every minute and he should not be charged that way. 

 I told Paul that he could remedy the situation by placing two telephone calls.  First, he needed to ask the local utility to install an “outside” water meter in addition to the existing meter.  Next, Paul need to call a plumber to connect his outside water system to the new “outside” water meter.  The new meter will differentiate the water type being used (inside versus outside) and Paul will get a more appropriate invoice. I warned Paul that this was not going to be a cheap fix.  It will likely cost him $2,000 for the meter and another $2,000 for the plumbing work.  However, it looks like he could save $600 - $800 per quarter on his bill so the payback period for Paul’s investment is under 7 heavy usage quarters.

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