Water charges for excessive usage

charlie14

Sleeper12 wrote: »

I've been following this on & off for 3 months now.

It'll be interesting to see how I get on. Four adults showering daily. I'm torn. Obviously I'm hoping to avoid the charges but I think I'll be disappointed if four adults escape the charges also

Why are you torn between hoping to avoid this proposed excess usage charge and not avoiding it

Benedict

IW do not live on Mars so they know better than anyone that they have created an almighty mess and they will now be desperately trying to figure out how to clean it up. They know that if people are treated unfairly, even the most solid citizens will rebel. So they are making a huge effort to pretend that all users will be caught and dealt with equally if they over-use water. Like Marianne84, they will never explain how this will happen, they just keep repeating that it will happen. They won't explain, because they can't. You can't bill the family in No 157 for using 50 litres too much if they don't have a meter because without a meter, you can't know what they have or have not used.

IW must now accept that this plan cannot work. It will only take one person to mount a legal challenge to a bill for excessive usage and the entire excessive usage plan will end up being shredded. (And those who have already paid a fine will get their money back.)

BarryD2

Benedict wrote: »

You can't bill the family in No 157 for using 50 litres too much if they don't have a meter because without a meter, you can't know what they have or have not used.

Precisely, which is why water metering should be extended to all residential properties as a matter of urgency.

BarryD2

BarryD2 wrote: »

Precisely, which is why water metering should be extended to all residential properties as a matter of urgency.

Don’t worry. It will be. In the uk people were given the choice of metering or set charge. Most took meters.

Benedict

Deleted User wrote: »

Don’t worry. It will be. In the uk people were given the choice of metering or set charge. Most took meters.

It may have escaped your attention that IW have stopped installing meters - and even if they re-started (which is doubtful) the people who prevented it first time around would prevent it again.

Right now, you can't get a meter even if you want one.


You need to get real.

McMurphy

BarryD2 wrote: »

Precisely, which is why water metering should be extended to all residential properties as a matter of urgency.

Non runner after the last Shambles.

Good luck with promising to do so in a manifesto too, any party that even hints at it will be destroyed in an election thanks to the incompetence of the previous lot.

Deleted User wrote: »

Don’t worry. It will be. In the uk people were given the choice of metering or set charge. Most took meters.

Remind me how your last predictions went Mary?

Benedict

M84 thinks OK, give them a choice between a meter or a charge. IW don't do meters anymore so No 157 Anywhare Road says "Okay, I'll have the meter please". So IW says "Eh, are you sure you wouldn't reconsider the charge? Eh! We don't know how much water you've used but your car looks awfully clean so would you consider Euro 375? Okay, how about 120? You wouldn't eh? Oh well, maybe we'll have better luck with No 159 - one of our inspectors distinctly heard a power shower from their house and timed it at 4 minutes."

BarryD2

Benedict wrote: »

It may have escaped your attention that IW have stopped installing meters - and even if they re-started (which is doubtful) the people who prevented it first time around would prevent it again.

Right now, you can't get a meter even if you want one.


You need to get real.

A fixed charge so of say €300 annually for all residential users of public water & sewage, attached to LPT if necessary. That'd do the trick. And you'd soon hear a chorus of people complaining about the unfairness of a fixed charge and demanding payment by metering.

Benedict

Benedict wrote: »

M84 thinks OK, give them a choice between a meter or a charge. IW don't do meters anymore so No 157 Anywhare Road says "Okay, I'll have the meter please". So IW says "Eh, are you sure you wouldn't reconsider the charge? Eh! We don't know how much water you've used but your car looks awfully clean so would you consider Euro 375? Okay, how about 120? You wouldn't eh? Oh well, maybe we'll have better luck with No 159 - one of our inspectors distinctly heard a power shower from their house and timed it at 4 minutes."

Not to worry. I’m sure that you will put up with a poor service, eg boil notifications, rather than pay.

Benedict

BarryD2 wrote: »

A fixed charge so of say €300 annually for all residential users of public water & sewage, attached to LPT if necessary. That'd do the trick. And you'd soon hear a chorus of people complaining about the unfairness of a fixed charge and demanding payment by metering.

Whatever the solution will be, IW will have to accept that they simply cannot give a waiver to one half of the users while hammering the other half.


And they need to stop pretending they'll be hammering the non-metered homes too because it's silly and they'll have to tell the truth in the end anyway.

Sleeper12

Benedict wrote:

It may have escaped your attention that IW have stopped installing meters - and even if they re-started (which is doubtful) the people who prevented it first time around would prevent it again.

In the UK house sales can't be completed unless a meter is in place. They also have a set up where you pay a high annual water fee if you have no meter. People with meters pay considerably less than people without a meter. Because of this most people ac want a meter.

The UKs carrot & stick approach is far better than FGs approach of setting police against normally law abiding citizens imo

Living Off The Splash

I have been reusing grey water for a long time now also keeping a 5 litre water bottle beside my sinks to collect good cold running water while waiting for hot water to come through the system. Then use in cistern.

I wonder how many million gallons of water were flushed through the system and wasted because of the water contamination in North County Dublin.

Pisses me off big time.

Snow Garden

Let's take a step back folks...before Irish Water start coming after the wasters....have they got their own house in order???

Last time I looked Irish Water was a wasteful bloated superquango with loads of problems;
- Overstaffed (2000 FG said)
- Too many senior managers
- Crony appointments (Tierney's RPS crew)
- Excessive salaries and bonus culture (29 earning > 100k with 15% bonuses)
- Dodgy contracts (EU said as much)
- Massive overspend on consultants
- Bureaurcracy (HSE Mark II)
- Massive legal bills
- Lack of any credible financial planning, just greed
- Secrecy/Lies
- Leaks caused by installing meters poorly
- Privatisation plans
- Poor Customer service

I know the awful CEO with a terrible track record got the boot but that cost the taxpayer 570,000 Euros!

Do let me know if you need links to any of above...I'll be your huckleberry.

_Kaiser_

Living Off The Splash wrote: »

I have been reusing grey water for a long time now also keeping a 5 litre water bottle beside my sinks to collect good cold running water while waiting for hot water to come through the system. Then use in cistern.

Maybe it's just me , but this is what grinds me about this whole "environmental" stuff at the moment - and you see it in comments like the above all over this site. Well-meaning I'm sure, but ultimately doing very little to address the REAL issues.

Because we can't make effective use of taxes, because of institutional corruption and greed, and because of the equal parts of "I'm alright Jack" and begrudgery that make up Irish society - we should all go back to living like we're in the 3rd world?

How about we stop pissing money away on bloated billing agencies, stop awarding valuable contracts under shady circumstances, and actually start fixing the leaks and the systems instead?

This country needs to really grow up in many ways, but simply taxing people more isn't the answer either! Efficiency and professionalism (granted, not something done well in this country!) is the answer here.

_Kaiser_

_Kaiser_ wrote: »

Maybe it's just me , but this is what grinds me about this whole "environmental" stuff at the moment - and you see it in comments like the above all over this site. Well-meaning I'm sure, but ultimately doing very little to address the REAL issues.

Because we can't make effective use of taxes, because of institutional corruption and greed, and because of the equal parts of "I'm alright Jack" and begrudgery that make up Irish society - we should all go back to living like we're in the 3rd world?

How about we stop pissing money away on bloated billing agencies, stop awarding valuable contracts under shady circumstances, and actually start fixing the leaks and the systems instead?

This country needs to really grow up in many ways, but simply taxing people more isn't the answer either! Efficiency and professionalism (granted, not something done well in this country!) is the answer here.

Probably best privatise it.

James Brown

Deleted User wrote: »

Probably best privatise it.

That was the plan. All the issues with it are down to the same people would have been privatising it.

Plumbthedepths

[Deleted User] wrote: »

Probably best privatise it.

Yeah it's working well for the UK. Although according to a FG minister at the time that was the goal . Usually this is how the case for privatisation is made, run down the public service to a degree that the public will accept privatisation. Pity it was so obvious.
Unfortunately the plebs disagreed.

Benedict

Deleted User wrote: »

Not to worry. I’m sure that you will put up with a poor service, eg boil notifications, rather than pay.

I'm quite prepared to pay if the system is fair. No problem.
But anyone who pays when their neighbours don't have to pay is a fool.

Look, you have been asked numerous times to explain exactly how you think IW can discover the usage of homes which have no meter and you haven't done it because you can't do it.


So once again, just tell us all how you think that No 157 Anywhere Avenue can be billed for using say 50 litres over quota when No 157 has no meter.


Tell us!


We're listening!


If you can't tell us, you should be humble enough to accept that you're mistaken.

K.Flyer

[Deleted User] wrote: »

Not to worry. I’m sure that you will put up with a poor service, eg boil notifications, rather than pay.

Be assured, if we were all on meters and everyone paid up, there will still be outages and boil notices.

K.Flyer

Sleeper12 wrote: »

In the UK house sales can't be completed unless a meter is in place. They also have a set up where you pay a high annual water fee if you have no meter. People with meters pay considerably less than people without a meter. Because of this most people ac want a meter.

The UKs carrot & stick approach is far better than FGs approach of setting police against normally law abiding citizens imo

Which is all well and good, but...
I.W. never had plans to meter apartments so straight away there was a disparity in how or who they were going to charge.
The idea of being offered meters or a fixed fee is a moot point because meters are not on offer for the foreseeable future.
Which means Any form of fixed fee becomes indiscriminate where in one house you could have an elderly single person using very little water compared to the family of four next door.

charlie14

BarryD2 wrote: »

Precisely, which is why water metering should be extended to all residential properties as a matter of urgency.

Not going to happen for any number of reasons.
Political suicide for one for any party that even mentioned it let alone attempted it.
Economically another Billion euro buried underground to join the other Billion euro already buried that never returned a red cent.
The definition of insanity by attempting to do the same as before and expecting a different result.
On top of all that,as admitted by Irish Water no way of metering vast numbers of apartments.

Snow Garden

Deleted User wrote: »

Probably best privatise it.

They nearly made a fool of you and the other gullible people that welcomed the bloated and corrupt superquango with open arms.

https://www.thejournal.ie/fergus-odowd-irish-water-agendas-privatisation-1825719-Dec2014/

FORMER JUNIOR MINISTER Fergus O’Dowd, one the people involved in setting up Irish Water, said last night that he felt that there were “forces at work” with “agendas” to privatise the utility company.

He said he remains “deeply concerned at other agendas, they may be European… I don’t know where they are coming from…” and said we have “real reason to be concerned” about the possibility of Irish Water being privatised.

It amazes me how some Irish people simply accept mediocrity and inefficiency so damn fast.

Benedict

Under the current plan, a wealthy family of six in a 3000 square foot luxury apartment in D4 with 4 or even 5 power showers would pay nothing for using many thousands of litres over the quota while a hard-pressed family of 4 with one bathroom could be subsidising the wealthy family. The plan is not only stupid it is grossly unfair and anyone who supports it should be ashamed of themselves.

Topgear on Dave

Deleted User wrote: »

Probably best privatise it.

Why? We've a boil water notice for the whole of Dublin and there hadn't been more than a shrug of the shoulders in the dail. Nobody cares.

If it was a private company that did this our socialist TDs would be standing on their dail seats and screaming the house down about this situation. :pac:

IW will go into the queue with all the rest of the projects in health, education, justice etc etc.

I advise keeping a few bottles of water in the house.

charlie14

Deleted User wrote: »

Probably best privatise it.

That was the plan.


With privatisation which do you think would be the main objective of a private company.
A. Fix the system and conserve water.
B. Increasing profits.

James Brown

Snow Garden wrote: »

They nearly made a fool of you and the other gullible people that welcomed the bloated and corrupt superquango with open arms.

https://www.thejournal.ie/fergus-odowd-irish-water-agendas-privatisation-1825719-Dec2014/



It amazes me how some Irish people simply accept mediocrity and inefficiency so damn fast.

Siteserv sweet deal still under investigation AFAIK.

James Brown

Topgear on Dave wrote: »

Why? We've a boil water notice for the whole of Dublin and there hadn't been more than a shrug of the shoulders in the dail. Nobody cares.

If it was a private company that did this our socialist TDs would be standing on their dail seats and screaming the house down about this situation. :pac:

IW will go into the queue with all the rest of the projects in health, education, justice etc etc.

I advise keeping a few bottles of water in the house.

Funny how water and the environment was a big concern at the highest levels when they were looking to monitise it. Back to not giving two f***s for another several decades.

Topgear on Dave

Matt Barrett wrote: »

Funny how water and the environment was a big concern at the highest levels when they were looking to monitise it. Back to not giving two f***s for another several decades.

The politicians will respond to voters.

Brendan Bendar

charlie14 wrote: »

That was the plan.


With privatisation which do you think would be the main objective of a private company.
A. Fix the system and conserve water.
B. Increasing profits.

That’s what private companies do, padre.

Increase productivity, increase efficiency, generate profit.

What do state companies do?

Bleed the taxpayer dry

Bed in a large number of ‘lifers’ who once they are ‘made permanent’ immediately either ,

A.... Fight the management backed by unions at every hands turn.

B... Set. Up your own business and work the system as a back up

C..Go on sick leave or disability and lie back while the euro s roll in

D.. use the nod and wink strategy where if in your area it’s a barter system, you lift my bins, all six of them:D, and I’ll sort out your plumbing problems for you.

E.. be backed up in Downeys of a Friday with a tray of pints a t 1300 hrs



You don’t fool anybody, buddy.

Topgear on Dave

Topgear on Dave wrote: »

Why? We've a boil water notice for the whole of Dublin and there hadn't been more than a shrug of the shoulders in the dail. Nobody cares.

If it was a private company that did this our socialist TDs would be standing on their dail seats and screaming the house down about this situation. :pac:

IW will go into the queue with all the rest of the projects in health, education, justice etc etc.

I advise keeping a few bottles of water in the house.

Exactly why it should be privatised. That way every TD in the country will be keeping an eye on them and every household will pay for what they use. Simples.