***ALL THINGS IRISH WATER/WATER CHARGE RELATED POST HERE***

Satriale

Any idea will there be any extra charges on the new IW bill like the PSO levy?

I only ask because i see the regulators of Irish Water, the CER, are rising the PSO on the Electricity bill this week by over 50% and just in case you like taxes on your taxes they will be charging VAT on that tax increase. Taxception.

Under the CER Ireland went from having some of the cheapest electricity in Europe to the 4th most expensive, (though this rise may take us higher up the list).


http://www.uswitch.ie/gas-electricity/news/2014/07/29/pso-levy-set-to-rise-by-over-50-percent-from-october-1st-2014/

dxhound2005

Satriale wrote: »

Any idea will there be any extra charges on the new IW bill like the PSO levy?

I only ask because i see the regulators of Irish Water, the CER, are rising the PSO on the Electricity bill this week by over 50% and just in case you like taxes on your taxes they will be charging VAT on that tax increase. Taxception.

Under the CER Ireland went from having some of the cheapest electricity in Europe to the 4th most expensive, (though this rise may take us higher up the list).


http://www.uswitch.ie/gas-electricity/news/2014/07/29/pso-levy-set-to-rise-by-over-50-percent-from-october-1st-2014/

Our resident cleric says that wages and dole are 40% higher than everywhere else so the electric bill should be affordable.

Guy:Incognito

Banjo string, heres the page from the link in your sig for you to add to show that you can give your PPS number to irish water, cos you seem to have forgotten to add that. http://www.welfare.ie/en/Pages/PPSN-Register-of-Users---Other-Users.aspx

Heres the list of "others" for those that don't like clicking links.

An Foras Aiseanna Saothair (FÁS)
An tÁrd-Chláraitheoir (The General Registrar)
Central Applications Office
Central Statistics Office (CSO)
Coillte Teoranta
Companies Registration Office (CRO)
Courts Service
Enterprise Ireland
General Medical Services Payments Board
Health and Social Care Professionals Council (known as Coru)
The Higher Education Authority (An tUdaras um Ard-Oideachas)
Irish Prison Service (IPS)
Irish Water
National Cancer Registry Board
Pensions Board
Personal Injuries Assessment Board
Quality and Qualifications Ireland
Road Safety Authority
The Teaching Council
The Legal Aid Board
The Private Residential Tenancies Board
The Private Security Authority
The Probate Office
The Property Services Regulatory Authority

Satriale

dxhound2005 wrote: »

Our resident cleric says that wages and dole are 40% higher than everywhere else so the electric bill should be affordable.

They'll need every bit of that 40% when the CER starts rising their Water bill. By Thursday the PSO levy will have gone up 233% since 2011.
Ten years time we could have the highest water bill in Europe, (thats if we dont already, does anyone know how much it will be yet?)

dxhound2005

Satriale wrote: »

They'll need every bit of that 40% when the CER starts rising their Water bill. By Thursday the PSO levy will have gone up 233% since 2011.
Ten years time we could have the highest water bill in Europe, (thats if we dont already, does anyone know how much it will be yet?)

It would be more informative if you stated the amounts of money involved. For me writing only on a personal basis the extra 50 cents per week is not going to cause me to lose my house.

Rucking_Fetard

Lads, ye wasted all day yesterday saying the same sh1te ye've been saying for the last 100 pages, the sun is shining, get outside the fu*ck.

Guy:Incognito

Satriale wrote: »

Ten years time we could have the highest water bill in Europe, (thats if we dont already, does anyone know how much it will be yet?)

Using that logic we could just as easily have the cheapest.

EazyD

Guy:Incognito wrote: »

Using that logic we could just as easily have the cheapest.

But we don't, you can be damn certain of that.

Satriale

Guy:Incognito wrote: »

Using that logic we could just as easily have the cheapest.

Maybe, but , as one of you pointed out to me here recently "the best way to predict future behaviour is to examine past behaviour".

lacco

Rucking_Fetard wrote: »

Lads, ye wasted all day yesterday saying the same sh1te ye've been saying for the last 100 pages, the sun is shining, get outside the fu*ck.

Yeah we should definitely enjoy the sun while theres no charge on it!!!

Banjo String

The attacks continue.

Irish Water's latest effort to convince us there's nothing to worry about doesn't help. When the political establishment speaks, or Corporate Ireland, it's increasingly difficult not to wonder if there's some sleight of hand that conceals the true agenda.

There's always been a level of suspicion. But the paranoia level today is moving out of deep orange and into blazing red. I get letters about - well, they're not all about - the Fine Gael/CIA secret base on Inishbofin to facilitate their joint selective assassination programme.

It's not healthy, seeing something sinister behind every move of the establishment.

But it is, I'm afraid, appropriate.

Let's take just two things from the past week: First, Irish Water's claim that the supply of public water is not being and cannot be privatised; and, second, Taoiseach Enda Kenny's deliberate deception of his colleagues, his party and the citizens.

Call me paranoid, but I believe two things about Irish Water. I believe it's building a database designed to produce a stable flow of wealth from one section of society to another - not just this year or next, but into the far future.

And I believe that there's a long term privatisation strategy under way.

Now, on the face of it, privatisation is impossible. Last week, we showed that the small print on the Irish Water website referred to a procedure for selling the company, and how Irish Water "may disclose Customer data to the prospective seller or buyer"; and that customers' personal data "will be one of the transferred assets".

Irish Water said that the website shouldn't have said that. The references have been removed.

Irish Water's head of communications, Elizabeth Arnett, has made various media appearances to assure us that our personal data is safe with them, and that there will be no privatisation.

The legislation, she said, prohibits privatisation. On Prime Time she said: "Irish Water cannot be sold, it's against the law". So, that sounds solid. No privatisation, it would be illegal.

But, would it? No doubt Ms Arnett believes so. She would have received a thorough briefing on what Irish Water wishes to tell us; the legal prohibition on privatisation would no doubt have been drawn to her attention. She would not, we can be confident, have been made privy to privatisation plans, as she would not then be able to stand over the company's claim that it cannot be sold - and there's no doubt that her statement was made in good faith.

What is the legislation that prohibits privatisation? It's the Water Services Act of 2013, part 1, which deals with company formation.

Section 5 (4) of the Act says that the Board will have one share in the company, and all remaining shares will be halved between the Minister for the Environment and the Minister for Finance.

Section 5 (6) says: "The Board shall not . . . alienate the share issued to it in accordance with subsection (4)".

Archaic language, but clear enough. Under this legislation, the Board is indeed prohibited from selling its one share. But, see those three dots?

Where those three dots are, the legislation says: "without the consent of the Minister and the Minister for Finance".

So, the legislation prohibits the Board from selling the company - unless the government wants it sold. The law, therefore, specifically allows for privatisation.

At which point, no doubt, our personal data will indeed become a saleable asset.

In internal strategy and training documents (Google them) Irish Water teaches its people about its strategy for changing our perception of ourselves.

A flow chart admits that we are "citizens". Then, an arrow points to the next stage, where we will be taught to see ourselves as "consumers"; and the next arrow on the chart takes us to the third stage of revelation.

And there we accept that we are "customers".

In two easy steps - we go from being citizens of a republic to being customers of a company.

The remodelling of capitalism goes on apace - a "new funding model" to refloat the system after the crash of 2008. To this end, income tax will be cut slightly, to make the gullible cheer, and the shift of wealth via "charges" and "levies" will continue.

It's all about "funding models". These lads would tax us for breathing, if they could find a way to attach meters to our throats.

While we were all trying to understand what's going on with Irish Water, and hoping it was more benign than it seemed - Enda Kenny chose that week to play silly buggers with the Seanad.

His preferred candidate for the Seanad bye-election, John McNulty, was dipped into the board of the Museum of Modern Art, so he'd have a smell of art off him, to qualify for the cultural panel.

A blatant stroke, but Enda made it clear it wasn't his doing. It was Minister Heather Humphreys's responsibility. She dutifully tried to outline the wonderful qualities that allegedly caused her to appoint McNulty.

In short - both of them sought to convince us it had nothing to do with Kenny. Michael Noonan weighed in, with a weird explanation about how in big parties "there's bound to be differences of opinion", and what mattered was that they "work through it as honestly as possible".

This was soothing stuff, putting Noonan's credibility behind the claim that nothing wrong was going on. And it was entirely divorced from reality. Noonan was saying that what was happening wasn't happening, that something else entirely was happening - to do with honest disagreements about policies.

This is beyond odd. This is seriously disturbed.

Then, it turned out none of them were aware of the law - McNulty couldn't be appointed while seeking election. The whole thing wasn't just a stroke, it was a stroke they were too incompetent to carry through.

At which point, according to the Irish Times, "Kenny apologises over McNulty debacle".

Really? Kenny said, "I take responsibility for this having evolved to what people might imagine it is."

Where's the apology? He takes responsibility. For the issue evolving into something distorted by our twisted imaginations.

"I accept responsibility perhaps for not taking a closer view of how this evolved." And Heather Humphreys had nothing to do with it.

Why didn't he - and she - tell us this at the beginning? Why did they mislead us that it was all about Humphreys?

Is it really okay for the Taoiseach to do what he did, then he makes a non-apology and everyone moves on?

Did Enda Kenny lie to us?

You won't find a straightforward statement in which he said he had nothing to do with the stroke. Instead, he said, "ministers are free to make nominations to particular boards". Sleeveen language. Deliberately deceptive, while taking pains not to formally lie.

Such things have happened down through the years. It's part of political life. But these days, under this government there's an arrogance born of self-belief that allows them to say what they like - because, they're the Good Guys, and what matters is that they win.

http://www.independent.ie/opinion/columnists/gene-kerrigan/never-mind-the-small-print-trust-us-30620675.html

Not to be trusted. Not for a second.

Satriale

dxhound2005 wrote: »

It would be more informative if you stated the amounts of money involved. For me writing only on a personal basis the extra 50 cents per week is not going to cause me to lose my house.

Nice to have it so good.

Would you throw half a fresh loaf of bread in the dustbin every week?

Guy:Incognito

Banjo String wrote: »

The attacks continue.



http://www.independent.ie/opinion/columnists/gene-kerrigan/never-mind-the-small-print-trust-us-30620675.html

Not to be trusted. Not for a second.

Much like one side poster sigs that leave out specific information to make thing looks like lies?

chasm

Banjo String wrote: »

The attacks continue.



http://www.independent.ie/opinion/columnists/gene-kerrigan/never-mind-the-small-print-trust-us-30620675.html

Not to be trusted. Not for a second.

He quotes the "Water Services Act of 2013, part 1" in that article, Part 2 contains this:
Amendment of Act of 2013
46.
The Act of 2013 is amended—

(a)in section 5 by substituting the following subsection for subsection (6):

“(6) (a)The Board shall not alienate the share issued to it in accordance
with subsection (4).

(b)The Minister shall not alienate the shares issued to him or her in accordance with subsection (4).

(c)The Minister for Finance shall not alienate the shares issued to him
or her in accordance with subsection (4).”,


http://www.irishstatutebook.ie/pdf/2013/en.act.2013.0050.pdf

eeepaulo

Does anyone know what is needed to change that legislation?

I opened the water services act pdf and felt the will to live draining out of me.

rsl1976

Should there be a reading on the meters now. Ours were reading zero on Thursday but 61 today. Live in a small cul de sac and all our meters now have readings

Ogham

rsl1976 wrote: »

Should there be a reading on the meters now. Ours were reading zero on Thursday but 61 today. Live in a small cul de sac and all our meters now have readings

All the meters should have been working since installation. They store the reading as at midnight on sept 30th - and that will be picked up by the drive by readers.

If it is 61 - is that the black numbers or the red? if black then 61000l is a lot in 4 days! But then again 61l is very little.

rsl1976

Its reading 00061. There are 5 adults and 2 children in my house. My neighbour who has 3 adults in her house is reading 00083 and another neighbour with 2 adults and 4 small children is reading 00042. All very confusing as I imagine the children would waste more.

dashcamdanny

Can the meter be removed and re installed without IW finding out?

Phoebas

dashcamdanny wrote: »

Can the meter be removed and re installed without IW finding out?

Of course.
Another money saving tip: When shopping in Tesco, simply place your groceries in your own bag and bypass the checkout.

dashcamdanny

Does the transponder on the meter detect tampering?

chasm

dashcamdanny wrote: »

Does the transponder on the meter detect tampering?

Yes, they detect various forms of tampering from the brochures i read online.

Leroy42

dashcamdanny wrote: »

Does the transponder on the meter detect tampering?

Doesn't matter. As its not on your property you cannot be held responsible if it is tampered with. IW would have to prove you were involved

Guy:Incognito

Leroy42 wrote: »

Doesn't matter. As its not on your property you cannot be held responsible if it is tampered with. IW would have to prove you were involved

Why not bypass your electricity and gas meters too sure?

If you steal everything you'll have loads of money.

chasm

Leroy42 wrote: »

Doesn't matter. As its not on your property you cannot be held responsible if it is tampered with. IW would have to prove you were involved

How do you know it is not on his property?

Little CuChulainn

Banjo String wrote: »

You're breaking Govt instructions (which are quite specific) about giving your PPS number out?


You fcuking rebel. Welcome aboard :pac:

I'm waiting for you to explain how it's ok to give your pps number to a mortgage company to get tax deductions at sources but it's not ok to give it to a utilities company to get a water allowance. Let's assume you come up with some reason, how to you suggest Irish Water confirm the number of people in a house in order to provide the correct allowance?

Recondite49

animaal wrote: »

Fair enough. As you pointed out, you pay income tax once you start to draw down the pension. But also, there's the "pension levy", which is used to confiscate a portion of your pension savings every year.

I.e. if you've already saved €100k in a fund (which is only enough to provide you with an annual income of about €4k!!), you'll pay a levy of €750 this year. That's likely to be more than the water charge (although IW won't yet tell us how much that will be).

I'm surprised there hasn't been more of a fuss about the pension levy. It's outright theft from a section of the population that's trying to provide for their own future, but designed so as not to apply to politicians.

Hi animaal,

I agree that this amounts to theft, particularly as once we start earning our pensions we'll pay tax on them.

Anyone's who interested in this can read a little about this on the Citizens Information website:

"Levy on private pension funds

There is a levy of 0.6% on the market value of assets which are managed in pension funds and pension plans approved under Irish tax legislation. (These include occupational pension schemes, Retirement Annuity Contracts and Personal Retirement Savings Accounts). This levy applies until the end of 2014. In 2014 an extra levy of 0.15% was introduced. This will continue to apply. This means that the total pension levy in 2014 is 0.75% and the levy from 2015 on will be 0.15%. You can find out more about the pension levy from the Pensions Authority. "

This means moving forward as you say, if your pension fund is worth €100,000 next year there'll be a levy of €150.

Of course, this most likely will be compensated in the long term by your employer's contributions and interest earned on the fund but the principle is rotten.

That said, while you can't avoid the levy applying to your pension fund, you can still do as I suggested to offset it. All you need to do is increase your contributions to offset the levy - the savings you make in income tax can balance it out.

For instance if you're a 30 year old contributing 5% of your €20,000 a year salary, according to the Citizens Information website you can put aside up to 20% of your earnings for tax relief.

In this case if our 30 year old started next year, they'd have put aside €1,000, €1.50 of which would be payable by way of a levy. 95% of the salary would be taxable at 27% (around €5,130 if we ignore deductions for married/single persons).

Increasing pension contributions to 6% would of course increase the levy to €1.80, however the amount of income tax paid on that person's salary would fall by €54 (again discounting the usual deductions).

This is an easy way for anyone to both avoid tax increases and provide for their future - most people of course won't do this, so we could easily pay the water charges from the public purse.

Leroy42

chasm wrote: »

How do you know it is not on his property?

You're right, I don't know it is not on their property. But since IW took the decision to locate the meters outside people's property to avoid any access right arguements then I was advising based on the normal situation.

Given that for them to have installed it on their property would have required consent it would seem strange for them to be now wondering if they can tamper with it.

In response to the why not ESB/Gas, it is exactly the same position. The company is well within their rights to take legal action should you attempt to tamper with the equipment.

The problem IW face is that unlike ESB/Gas meters IW meters are (in the majority of cases) located outside a person9n property rather than within the boundaries and as such they cannot (without proof) say that you tampered with it

dxhound2005

Satriale wrote: »

Nice to have it so good.

Would you throw half a fresh loaf of bread in the dustbin every week?

No. I eat all of the food that I buy. I don't see any point in buying it and then throwing it away. Unlike the average house in this country which throws away about one third of the food they buy. Around €1000 a year. That is a nice money saving tip for people who think they might struggle to pay for their water. Similarly with petrol and electricity. Probably cost the average person many multiples of what they will pay for water. Savings to be made there. And in some cases it may be prudent to switch some of the expenditure on alcohol to help pay for water. There is much scope there with over €6 billion going on alcohol every year.

On the subject of the PSO Levy which you made such a song and dance about, I agree with the objectives of the levy and I hope my extra 50 cents goes some way to achieving them. I'm just back in for the great outdoors, it is very nice out there.

PSO Levy explained
The Public Service Obligation (PSO) Levy is paid by all electricity customers and helps subsidise government schemes that relate to national policies on renewable energy targets, indigenous fuels such as peat and to the security of the energy supply.

chasm

Leroy42 wrote: »

You're right, I don't know it is not on their property. But since IW took the decision to locate the meters outside people's property to avoid any access right arguements then I was advising based on the normal situation.

Given that for them to have installed it on their property would have required consent it would seem strange for them to be now wondering if they can tamper with it.

In response to the why not ESB/Gas, it is exactly the same position. The company is well within their rights to take legal action should you attempt to tamper with the equipment.

The problem IW face is that unlike ESB/Gas meters IW meters are (in the majority of cases) located outside a person9n property rather than within the boundaries and as such they cannot (without proof) say that you tampered with it

I live in an estate which has a large percentage of privately owned homes yet quite a lot of the meters are on the footpaths leading up to the front door - my own included -i don't own my home so i couldnt say whether consent had to be given. The meters here seem to be wherever the original water access point was located, so some are on the public footpaths, some are on the footpath of the house.

Regarding tampering and proof, which i think have been discussed here already if people don't mind a day in court and whatever costs (financial or otherwise) are associated with that, well that's their choice. I personally wouldn't agree with it or advise it, but i only make the decisions for my house