Water usage/bills?? UPDATE Post #1

I am thoroughly confused. We just got our 1st water bill for our house and it says that in 63 days, we used 35,158 GALLONS of water. That is a bill of $180.

Is it me or is this extremely high?? We have a 3 zone sprinkler system that runs every other day for a total of 60 minutes. It just spritzes really though. We take 1 shower/day each and are out of the day at work all day. I'm out of the shower in less than 5 minutes. DH takes maybe 10-15. We run the dishwasher 3x/week and I do 2 loads of laundry per week.

Our property abuts a commercial property/restaurant that is owned by the people we bought our house from. Is it possible that they are somehow on our meter??

UPDATE: Aqua NY was supposed to come today, but I had to cancel b/c of a funeral. The woman said I would reschedule. I just came home now to find a note in my mailbox that says that "You have no leaks. Use of sprinklers causes high bill." They read the meter and it says I have used 6,800 gallons of water in the past 12 days -- 6 of which we haven't been home for, and 4 of which the sprinklers were completely off. That means they have been on only 4 times in this time period.I am confused. I am going to call again tomorrow to ask them to come back b/c I want to run the sprinklers and get a reading on how many gallons they could possibly be using in their 60 minute every other day usage!

Does anyone know how many gallons a sprinkler uses? I don't get this.

Message edited 8/9/2010 4:55:30 PM.

Re: Water usage/bills??

I totally think that is way too high. I would give them a call and ask them to come out to check on it because that really doesn't seem right

Re: Water usage/bills??

Ours is about $20 every 3 months with IGS!

Re: Water usage/bills??

The water co was closed so I have to call tomorrow, but I talked to the previous owners today and she said that their bill was $58 for 2 months and in the summer it was a little higher b/c of sprinkler, but definitely never that high.

Re: Water usage/bills??

Here's a calculator to estimate how much water you might be using:
http://www.csgnetwork.com/waterusagecalc.html

I saw another site that said an average of 50gal/person/day

So, for the two of you, a very rough estimate should be 6,300 gallons for that time period.

Re: Water usage/bills??

we are paying about $60 every two months in the summer and in winter $35 we water the lawn every other day and the plants every day, we are only two people though.

Re: Water usage/bills??

ww

that seems very high

Re: Water usage/bills??

I will say that's a lot of watering. We had a bill like that once, when we had a leak in our pool and were constantly filling it and we forgot to change the sprinklers and they were going 30 minutes everyday. (6 zones)

Re: Water usage/bills??

may be a dumb question, but is there anyway we can read our own meter with everything off in our house? it's the metal plate on the curb and underground, like most of LI.... we can't gain access to that as a homeowner w/o the water company, right?

Re: Water usage/bills??

OK, they are coming on Monday to radio-read the meter again for me and check for leaks. The last reading they took was the beginning of our vacation out of the country. By Monday we will have only been home for 10 days, so let's see what the # is there.

The lady wasn't really very helpful and was just like "you used that much water."

Re: Water usage/bills?? UPDATE Post #1

bump for update in post 1.... anyone have any ideas??? I am thoroughly perplexed now.

Re: Water usage/bills?? UPDATE Post #1

We have aqua ny and the bills are always higher than what other towns bills are.

Re: Water usage/bills?? UPDATE Post #1

Yeah, I know Aqua's rates are higher, but now I'm just looking at the exorbitant # of gallons they say we are using

Re: Water usage/bills?? UPDATE Post #1

Our bill from Aqua in June was for 56 days and it says we used 24,685 gallons. The sprinklers use a lot of water. I don't think we had them on for most of May, so this bill should be bigger.

Re: Water usage/bills?? UPDATE Post #1

That seems crazy high, we have IGS and our bill for two months was $55

Re: Water usage/bills?? UPDATE Post #1

Re: Water usage/bills?? UPDATE Post #1

The only thing I could think of is with the sprinklers maybe there is a crack in the line somewhere and water is seeping into the ground even when the sprinklers aren't on...

Re: Water usage/bills?? UPDATE Post #1

We just got our water bill and it's for 42K gallons of water for three months. but it's for $40 or something.


I would cut back on your watering time. 10 minutes a day or 20 minutes every other day.

Re: Water usage/bills?? UPDATE Post #1

Re: Water usage/bills?? UPDATE Post #1

Posted by rkoenke

Posted by jenheartsrob

Yeah, I know Aqua's rates are higher, but now I'm just looking at the exorbitant # of gallons they say we are using

our bills have been outrageous as well. i think they are full of BS if you ask me.

just letting you know, you can open that metal plate and shut off the water even if you wanted to... that's how they determine there are no leaks somehow.

please let me know how you do.

they billed me for four months and threatened to shut me off, even though they never sent me a bill until this 300.00 bill. Boy was I PIZZZED!!


again, i hate them.

but... rest assured, you'll get a 20.00 rebate next spring due to over charging us.
thanks.

Re: Water usage/bills?? UPDATE Post #1

Fact of the day:

Just talked to a nice guy at Aqua who helped me figure out with his chart that a 3 zone sprinkler on for 20 minutes every other day uses 25,000 gallons in a 2 month billing period. Ummmm - no more watering lawn, period.

Re: Water usage/bills?? UPDATE Post #1

We have sprinklers and take 1-2 showers, run the dishwasher, give the girls bathes - fill baby pool or water toys and we are NO WHERE near that amount. Something isn't right. I have to check but I think our bill is something like $30 or so for a couple of months (3 maybe?) - DH usually does the bills but that is what I remember him saying recently.

Message edited 8/10/2010 12:24:17 PM.

Re: Water usage/bills?? UPDATE Post #1

Re: Water usage/bills?? UPDATE Post #1

I just got our water bill from Aqua today. They say that we used over 40,000 gallons of water in a 2-month period and our bill is $240.

I remembered this thread and thought I'd contribute. Our last bill, before daily sprinkler usage, was just over $100. So it seems as though by the end of the year, we'll be paying almost $1000 for water.

But hey, like Rachel said, I'll be getting a $20 rebate in a few months!

Re: Water usage/bills?? UPDATE Post #1

got my aqua bill yesterday too..........it was $178. Our bills are usually around $100, so the jump is really just from the sprinklers because nothing else changed.