Also with code SMARTSTYLE you can get buy one get one free for their summer sale.
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Well, every time you flush the toilet, you’re using water, it’s just that it’s water in, not water out.
It’s really a great deal that they only count sewer on 85% of your water usage, though! I’ve always had it based on 100% which is annoying when you are watering gardens, and even more annoying if you’re filling a pool.
It doesn’t seem like an exorbitant usage, but the cost is a little higher than I’m used to.
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You all made me curious so I looked up our bills and usage history. They only use one water reading and that is applied to sewage and water. It is also billed on a 2 month cycle, so this is for 2 months at a time. In the winter we used 7,000 gallons per cycle, which averages to 3500 per month. For that 7,000 gallons our bill was $36.75 water, $33.93 sewer, and $31.70 in fee. I remember before B was born our bill was always exactly the same, $82.00 which was the minimum monthly fee because we didn’t use enough water to go above the lowest level.
We have not received a bill yet for June/July in this house. I am sure it is going to be 2-3x as high because of all the watering/pool fill ups/playing in the sprinkler.
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Now why can’t the water company’s site put that in plain English like that? (unless I missed it, which is possible.)
I pulled up all my existing bills because you all inspired me to look more closely at them and here’s what I found.
boring water data
April bill: 4 days (my account had just been opened), estimate, 700 gallons. I have no idea how they arrived at this number as we were not even living in this apartment on these 4 days and I don’t believe we turned the water on either, the POD hadn’t even arrived. But, well, it’s an estimate and they had to put down something, I suppose.
May bill: 30 days, actual reading, 800 gallons. So, a chunk of this billing period, we were still not living in this apartment, we were going back and forth between here and the short-term rental and moving in. This reading is therefore probably artificially low.
June bill: 30 days, estimate, 200 gallons. ?? This is clearly fictional, I do not know how they arrived at this. But again, estimate.
July bill: 36 days, actual, 4,400 gallons.
OK, so, I think what is going on here is that the estimates have been artificially low, plus July had a longer billing cycle for some reason. And probably July’s bill is more in line with what we are actually using, and thus is the amount I should budget for.
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But, like… some of the water is being drunk by people or animals? Or going into recipes? So it is not a straight what goes in must come out situation? I mean, we don’t pee out EVERY drop we drink! Leaving aside what goes back into the ground via gardening. That is super annoying!
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I have always found this super annoying as well. I investigated it a few years ago when I was trying to get to the bottom of why my bill was exactly the same each month. I was like, are they actually reading the meter? Why does it always say X gallons regardless of how much I try to cut down?! Then I discovered that you only have 1 water meter, so they don’t have a separate meter that they can use to measure how much water is going down the sewer, separate from how much is entering your home. That’s also when I discovered that even when I felt like we were using a lot of water, we were still under the threshold for the minimum amount used so our bill was based upon that minimum amount.
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I think it’s only really significant if you’re filling a pool, which is why people sometimes buy tank of pool water from sources other than the water department. That way you don’t get billed for sewer, too.
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Our water utility has a number you can call when you are going to fill a pool so that it’s adjusted.
My current water gripe is that our HOA requires access to our sprinkler program so they can adjust our usage for “proper” lawn care. I’m considering getting a lock for it after having 2 extra days of watering added to our weekly schedule.
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Major side eye there. Have they not met Florida in summer? I have weeks-old sod down and according to the internet I should still be giving it a light watering a couple times a day but I stuck my finger down into the dirt and it was still damp. It’ll be fine.
The water conversation had me looking at my utility bill earlier and they just invoice us by per thousand gallons. Huh, TIL. 3k for three people with a yard/garden/child that likes playing with the hose outside.
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We have a water sensor on it, but ANOTHER GRIPE is that I don’t think it works. It freaking poured buckets the past few days and yet my sprinklers were on when I got home from errands on Saturday afternoon.
ALSO who the crap waters at 2 in the flipping afternoon during the Florida summer?! Have fun paying for evaporation!
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Something else that site mentioned is it seems like $24/month for your trash bill is also accounted for in your “water” bill. Idk if you’re seeing that on your bill too but yours could be higher because it includes trash too.
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Yes, that is a flat fee and I can’t control that part.
Totally understood! Just saying that is a cost other people pay separately normally and it’s included in this bill to help you put the total cost in perspective. We pay $20/month for trash outside of water.
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Yup, and mine just went up to $40 per month, also paid on a 2-month basis.
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So y’all got me looking at our water bill. We have a bill every three months. But Hubby pays a bit down on it every month. It’s very interesting. Our wastewater charges are more than our consumption charges. And the City charges us for their right of way on the first 16’ of our property, where they put the water line!
Our bill looks like this…
$39.00 base water charge
$21.47 water consumption
$45.61 wastewater discharge
$42.00 base charge wastewater
$6.95 Stormwater (I think this is because we’re on a hill?)
$10.00 City right of way
Total bill for three months for two adults is $164.83 CAD.
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Apparently we used some 17kga last.month. 2 adults and a small furry monster. Quarter acre lot size. Our bill includes trash pickup and also gas (used for dryer and water heating), it was some $242.
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This is all very interesting water bill anecdata to someone like me who’s literally never had to directly pay one before.
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So I feel like your pattern is to jump to assuming you’re doing things wrong and torturing yourself/jumping through hoops before you collect the info to see if what’s happening is actually out of spec/above expected at all? Do you think you could try to mentally add a check point with yourself, “do I know if this is actually bad or unexpected? How can I gather this info?” Before starting to beat yourself up? Might save you some stress 
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Woohoo my saving account interest rate just went up to 1.40% apy. Living large over here!
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Yeah, that’s fair. I am really frustrated with my savings progress and I don’t always know what is and isn’t in my control as far as frugality. So I usually assume I am just bad at voluntary discomfort.
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