The cost of water is rising, and water affordability is a growing concern for many households. To address this, many utilities are adopting modern metering technology, which enables them to rapidly notify households of atypical consumption that may indicate a leak.
Below, you’ll find real-life examples and promising practices that help households struggling with high water bills.
Leaky Plumbing Can Lead to High Water Bills
Water affordability is determined by two main factors—the cost of water service and a household’s income—but some households’ high bills are due to inefficient fixtures or leaks.
Spikes in water consumption associated with even a small leak can cause bills to skyrocket if not addressed in a timely manner. The first indication of a problem for many account holders is when a higher-than-normal water bill arrives. For households already struggling to pay their bills, such leaks can further exacerbate their ability to pay, possibly resulting in late fees and service disconnection.
Leaks are especially common in older homes, and leak alerts could help notify residents, as evidenced by these real-life examples:
- A resident of Broadview, Illinois pre-paid his water bill in anticipation of out-of-town travel. He returned home to discover a leak in his home’s internal plumbing—and a water bill of roughly $2,000. A text message or email notification about the spike in usage might have allowed him to ask a family member or friend to investigate and avoid a high bill.
- A resident of Highland Park, Illinois received a leak notification while he was out of town for the holidays. Family checked on the home and found extensive damage caused by a leak that ultimately resulted in 45,000 gallons of water pouring through his living room, as reported by CBS News.
- Another Highland Park resident received two notifications through the city’s leak alert system. The first was about a leaky toilet that she couldn’t hear because it was in her basement, and the second was ultimately traced to a broken sprinkler head in her yard. Although she still received a bill of about $1,200, the city’s leak alert program allowed her to learn about and fix the issues before her bill went even higher.
Consumer Portals for Leak Alerts and Improved Water Affordability
It used to be common for water utilities to send staff out on foot and read meters manually. The development of Automated Meter Reading (AMR) improves on this, but it’s still slow—with metering data generally collected once per month.
Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI), on the other hand, takes advantage of the Internet of Things (IoT) technology and transfers metering data via cellular infrastructure. Data is transferred several times per day, and some AMI systems collect metering data at 15-minute intervals. The increased frequency of data collection allows utilities and consumers to monitor water usage, compare past consumption, and identify leaks more quickly.
Many water utilities that use AMI technology provide consumer portals where users can pay their bills, view current and historical usage, track trends over time, and set up leak alerts. Users can select a threshold at which they wish to be notified and register multiple phone numbers and email addresses for alerts. Leak alerts are generated when the system registers continuous flow over a set period of time.
Here’s a few examples:
- The municipal water utility in Park City, Utah, uses AMI technology and reported that the system sent over 150 leak alerts within the first three months, and 70% of the issues were resolved within 10 days.
- Water customers in Evanston, Illinois, can sign up for leak alert notifications through their WaterSmart program. If the customer cannot identify the source of the leak, the city will dispatch Public Works staff to help customers identify leakage issues. Staff do not fix anything, but they help identify leaks; this service is offered free of charge. When the resident shows proof that the issue has been resolved—e.g., with an invoice from a licensed plumber—Evanston waives the charges related to the leak.
- The San Antonio Water System waives charges related to leaks after they have been repaired by a licensed plumber. They also offer a program called Plumbers to People that provides emergency water leak repair assistance to income-eligible residents.
Stay Tuned: Municipal Toolkit is Underway to Advance Leak Notifications
A consumer portal is only valuable if households sign up for it, which is not always easy or straightforward. Utilities can promote the portal via websites, on water bills, in fliers and brochures, with door hangers, on social media, and more. Many of the best practices for engaging your community around lead service line replacement also apply to encouraging customers to sign up for consumer portals.
A project is underway in the Village of Phoenix, Illinois, where Elevate is developing an outreach strategy and communications materials to help increase the adoption of the village’s consumer portal. The lessons learned and materials developed through this technical assistance project will be incorporated into a toolkit for other municipal utilities to use. Stay tuned for more details as the project progresses.
Another resource to consider is Cook County Leak Repair, a program that provides free plumbing repairs and fixture upgrades to help eligible suburban Cook County residents stop leaks and save money on water bills.