Water meter read mistake
This customer checked their water meter after moving into their new home and uncovered a discrepancy.
After buying and moving into a new home, the customer compared their water meter with the meter read that had been done before settlement. It was 249 kilolitres higher.
As the home had been vacant for 5 weeks and there was no concealed water leak, the customer questioned this water usage. In the first week of living there, the customer used only 2 kilolitres, confirming there was no leak.
The water provider confirmed that the customer's read was accurate, but refused to change the pre-settlement read.
During our investigation, the provider agreed the pre-settlement meter read may have been a mistake and offered to adjust the read based on the previous residents’ water use – a $408 credit.
However, we didn’t believe this was fair for the customer, so we negotiated for the provider to calculate the customer's water use between when they bought the home and when they did the new read. This resulted in a $881 credit.