On a slow-ish Saturday afternoon, you can meander over to the WSB Forums if you haven’t already. Among the current discussion – Tigger and others are trying to figure out why their utility bills suddenly jumped. (Also browsable, the 100+ West Seattle-based sites that feed into the Blogs page – their latest entries are linked here.)
Our family was shocked, our bill was $350. 3 people live in my house. The bill was so much more than summer time, when we use water for the lawn and garden.
We’re now not flushing the toliet unless it’s #2…
Interesting to know that it isn’t only our family. We were sure we had a terrible water leak, but the electric bill is also sky-high. It seems odd that our usage habits would change that dramatically in only two months!
Maybe we should all call and complain (or at least demand an explanation), it helps! From the forum and now here, it appears that a lot of people have seen an increase (us included).
I will be sending a note to our SPU media contact in hopes of finding out if something’s up, from their standpoint, as well … TR
Same thing happened to us. I called and the explanation we got was mostly about bill estimation. There is a recording of all the reasons a bill would be high including as Jeannette suggested possible water leaks, fyi.
From what I was told, SPU has one meter reader in our area right now which means there is a whole lot of estimating going on. If a meter is obstructed by a parked car or something like that then the reader has even more reason to estimate and keep on going.
When a reading is finally done after months of estimation, if the reading is higher than what had been estimated in the past it gets adjusted. I also learned that sewer is based on water usage so if your water “use” goes up … you guessed it so does the sewer. I asked about the chart on our bills but since so much estimation goes on it is pretty useless.
The person with whom I spoke was quite helpful and suggested I check my meter myself which I did with her on the phone. Sure enough, the number was almost exactly what my super high bill said it was. She did say if the meter would have read lower than their estimation I would have been able to submit my findings for review and possible re-estimation.
Not sure it I am recalling all this exactly so I am looking forward to what TR finds out, too.
Same thing at our house. My wife called me in to ask how much time I’m spending in the bathroom…glad to know it wasn’t just me.
Wasn’t there a utilities rate hike after the first of the year?
I pointed that out in the forum thread to which this item refers. But it was 11 cents per CCF. For our bill, for example, that’s an extra $2, even less for many of those discussing!
Had the same problem here, total bill up 25% from last year and I’m the only person in my house. Less usage, higher bill!
Hmmm…our bill was actually a bit less this month (compared to the previous bill) but our electric bill has been sky high even though I’ve been doing all I can to cut back.
The flyer with the bill said new rates took effect on Jan. 1st. My bill was 20% than usual even though water consumption was the same.
The dollar amount of the bill wouldn’t change that much due to the Jan 1st rate hike. It was only about a quarter per CCF, and with most houses using less than 10 CCF’s in a billing cycle…then it’s really not that much.
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What people should be looking at is the water usage (how many CCF’s) that are showing on the bill. That CCF amount is used to calculate the water portion AND the sewer portion of the bill.
Our bill was higher.
Our compated usage was way done (on a consumed and per day average usage). This should be the fist tipoff to people if something is amiss such as a leak. Comparing the usage from the previous year usually clues me in if our average use if up or down accordingly.
Even though the rate hate was supposed to take effect Jan 1, we seemed to have been billed at the higher rate since the November start period.
Thank you King county metro, city council, mayor mccheese and others for supporting the higher rate increases
Get ready for this summer when the utilities come crying that revenue shrank because usage was down (isn’t this what we are trying to accomplish?), and rates must be increased to make up for the shortfall in revenues. You can’t win in a good year, or a bad year.
Was anyone else charged for trash pick UPS that didn’t happen? I was charged for 5 cans one week and don’t even own 5. Something is going on. My bill doubled. Same levels of use but 2x the bill.
I think Seattle City Utility had a gremlin. Our trash did not get picked up, so we called and were told that we lived in a vacant house. We did just move in September, but had paid one bill. Got the bill next day and sure enough had a bunch of credits due to vacancy. Although we were vacant, we still had a $100 bill. Hopefully we get our trash/recyle/yard waste picked up this week. Hmmmm. Not sure how they thought we were vacant….
Sorry, comment time is over.
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