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Water bill validation by water industry experts is the only way a business can ensure accurate water bills.

Do you trust your water retail company to send your business accurate water and waste water bills?

 

Well if you do water industry experts will probably ask you to think again.

 

Every year in the UK 1,000’s of businesses are paying water, waste water and trade effluent bills which are incorrect resulting in £millions worth of revenue going back to both water retail companies and water wholesale companies.

 

These incorrect charges are for services not provided or an incorrectly applied tariff and the water companies will not tell you about the overcharging, in fact it is you the customer that has to ensure the charges are correct according to many water retail companies.

 

It may surprise you to learn in some instances the water retailers will not refund all of the overcharges so it is even more important that you ensure your business is not being overcharged as you may not receive all of your money back!

 

What is the scale of the overcharging in terms of money? and are there any water retail company areas more prone to overcharging than others?

 

H20 Building Services reports significant refunds and reduced costs going forwards on water, water water and trade effluent bills, examples such as: –

 

Steel company Yorkshire – £30,000 per year overcharges

£60,000 refunded

 

Automobile sales and service company – £15,000 per year overcharges Severn Trent area

£90,000 refunded

 

National trade retailer – Total overcharge refunded £150,000 Severn Trent area

 

These are the most prominent cases in terms of high value with many other cases of overcharging of between £50,000 and down to £5,000

 

With hundreds of water and waste water bills rejected by the water bill validation team at H20 just after water deregulation April 2017 and even now.

 

Prior to water market deregulation the water company overcharging was bad enough but since the water retail market opened up in Scotland and then England the amount of water bills that H20 are capturing and rejecting due to incorrect charging has increased 100 per cent.

 

There is every reason to conclude many thousands of businesses and organisations have been and will continue to be overcharged although it has to be said undercharging  is on a very small scale.

The situation is set to get even worse as water companies that have merged their businesses to become larger water retailers merge their client water accounts from two different systems to one.

 

Water retail companies such as: –

 

Wave – Which is a joint venture between Northumbrian Water Group Business and Anglian Water Business, creating a new water retail company capable of sending out even more incorrect water bills.

 

The other notable merger of two water companies is Water Plus which is a joint venture between United Utilities and Severn Trent Water. Again a joint venture with incorrect water billing that has increased substantially and customer service is at rock bottom.

 

Graham Mann Senior Partner of H20 Building Services is extremely concerned at the increasing levels of incorrect billing and poor customer service as over the last 6 months some water retailers are showing what appears to be an attitude of complete and utter disregard for customers and complete ignorance of complaints and complaints procedures.

With cases of 5 complaints on one case alone and not one complaint processed within their own complaints system, they are effectively ignored!

 

Never have we seen this level of disruption and chaos

 

But will customer overcharges be refunded? 

 

No in a nutshell, unless businesses and organisations enter into a water bill validation agreement with water industry experts as the likely hood is the incorrect water bills will continue to be paid as the water retailers will continue to send out incorrect water bills until they are challenged either by their customers or the water industry experts that represent them.

 

Please do not expect any refunds to be forthcoming in a few weeks the average is now 6 months !

 

One does have to wonder what would happen if customers took 6 – 9 months to pay water bills, by this time customers would surely have a County Court Summons on their desk demanding payment.

 

Meanwhile here is the 2nd refund cheque for one of the clients stated above.

 

Yorkshire Water cheque - Water bill validation

 

 

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