national multiple family submetering and allocation billing program ...

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financially responsible for their own water and wastewater service costs. In RUBS properties, common areas should be separately metered. If not possible, a reasonable estimate of common area usage can be made that is based on the property’s specific common area amenities. 4) Water audit and leak repair. Before instituting any separate billing system, the property owner/manager shall conduct a water audit of all units and common areas, testing for leaks, including toilet tank flapper valve leaks, and repair all leaks identified. Upon institution of the separate billing system, the property owner/manager shall commit to a reasonable standard of leak repair in all units, and shall maintain sufficient supplies of materials as may be necessary to ensure that common types of leaks (such as toilet flappers) are promptly repaired. When properly reported, non-emergency leakage at any plumbing fixture or fitting should be repaired within 5 business days. The process for reporting leaks and the owner/manager's commitment to leak repair shall be clearly stated in each resident's bill, and shall also be disclosed as part of the lease agreement. 5) Pass through of water and wastewater costs. Both the commodity and fixed service charges for water and wastewater shall be equivalent to the commodity charges contained in the property owner's bill from the local water and wastewater utility. 47 Neither the billing entity nor the owner/manager shall inflate the costs of these charges. Utility commodity charges and the billing entity charges shall be clearly stated on every bill provided to residents and such rates and charges shall also be disclosed as part of the rental agreement. 6) Submetering and RUBS methods and notification. Water and wastewater bills to residents shall be calculated on the basis of fair and reasonable methods of cost allocation, including submeter readings or allocation formulas. The measurement or allocation method and/or formula is considered a matter of public record and shall be clearly stated on every bill provided to residents. The water and wastewater billing arrangement shall be fully disclosed to the resident in the rental agreement. When a new billing program is started, owners shall provide residents with at least 60 days notice prior to implementation. Billing can only begin after lease signing/renewal. 7) Billing practices. Water and wastewater bills shall be sent promptly after meter readings are made or after the master-meter bill from the utility is received. This is essential to ensure that the price signal is received in reasonably close proximity to the time of consumption. A reasonable amount of time (minimum of 10 business days) shall be allotted between the residents' receipt of a bill and the date payment is due. 8) Records retention and inspection. The property's master water and wastewater utility bills shall be retained for a period of not less than 24 months, and shall be available for inspection by any resident at reasonable hours and without charge. However, a nominal fee can be charged for any requests to copy bills. 47 In most cases, these charges will be based on the local utilities' rate schedules for multifamily housing, often priced by the size of the service connection to the master meter. In the case of duplex, 3-family, and 4-family units, the smaller service connections to these structures may result in their being charged at the same rate as single-family residences. 272
9) Fees. The billing entity may charge reasonable fees. Fees are divided into two categories: (a) recurring service fees; and (b) other fees. Recurring service fees (also called monthly fees, administrative fees, or meter fees) shall be charged to the property owner/property manager, not to the residents. Where not subject to regulation, the owner is in the best position to negotiate favorable service fee charges with the billing company and responsibility for recurring service fees gives the owner an interest in negotiating the best fee. Property owners should pay the meter service fee since it is part of the infrastructure of the building and as such would be like repair and maintenance of any building supplied fixture or appliance. Other fees (new account fees, late fees, returned check fees, and other reasonable fees that relate to a specific resident account) shall be paid by the residents. 10) Complaints and disputes. A fair method for promptly resolving complaints and billing disputes shall be established by the billing entity that should have parity to the process that exists for the property owner contesting a bill to the local water utility. The billing entity shall be available during normal business hours via a toll free number, printed on every bill, to handle billing questions and complaints. 11) No shutoff of service. As stated by law, water and wastewater service cannot be shutoff to residents by the owner or his agents. The rental agreement can provide for a utility deposit or other legal remedy through which unpaid utility bills can be collected. 12) Information to be included in regular bills. The bill is the fundamental communication between the billing entity and the resident. As such, bills must be clear, comprehensible, and comprehensive. Billing entity water and wastewater bills shall include: (a) Clear statement of the current water and wastewater commodity charges and fees as well as any overdue or pending amounts; (b) (c) (d) (e) Billing period covered by the bill; Date payment is due; Date after which payment is overdue; Explanation of the billing method (Submetering, RUBS, hybrid); (f) Explanation of how charges are determined for current billing period. For submetering this will simply be a beginning and ending meter read, the volume consumed, and the commodity rate per unit volume. For hybrid metering this will be a beginning and ending meter read, the (hot or cold water) volume consumed, the calculation for allocating the remaining water volume, and the commodity rate per unit volume. For RUBS this should include the total volume of water used at the property (as measured by the utility at the master meter(s)), the deductions for common area, the percent of remaining amount allocated to the 273
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NATIONAL MULTIPLE FAMILY SUBMETERIN
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CONTENTS LIST OF TABLES............
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Matched-Pair Analysis .............
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LIST OF TABLES Table ES.1.1 Breakdo
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Table 6.6 Elasticity values, analys
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Figure 4.30 RUBS water bill #6 ....
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investigated local water savings as
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We are grateful to the members of a
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quantitative aspects of separate bi
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3. Owner/postcard survey: To identi
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"averages" of impact property water
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in-rent properties, others used the
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of these models included the billin
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70 Average Annual Water Use Per Uni
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COSTS AND BENEFITS Beyond quantifyi
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service charge, then the resident w
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Billing Method Efficient Fixtures?
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70 Avg. Water Use per MF Unit (kgal
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REGULATORY FRAMEWORK REVIEW The fra
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Table ES.1.12 NSUAA Summary of Stat
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above, the researchers offer the fo
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service is preferable, and would he
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practices (BMPs) should be implemen
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infrastructure of the building and
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multi-family housing. The transfer
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CHAPTER 1 INTRODU CTION More and mo
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In 1998, 15.0%, or 15.4 million, of
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TERMINOLOGY AND DEFINITIONS OF BILL
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submetering. With utility-submeteri
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all the two bedroom units for $20 p
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HOW TO USE THIS REPORT This report
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CHAPTER 2 LITERAT URE REVIEW As the
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A review of the literature unearthe
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The price elasticity of water deman
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expected. Additionally, McClelland
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submetered and five control (in-ren
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Another study might want to target
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CHAPTER 3 RESEARC H METHODS, APPROA
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1. Selection of participating study
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STUDY SITE SELECTION The Study aime
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Figure 3.2 National Multiple Family
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Matched pair protocol/survey - conf
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information given the available bud
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survey. Service companies that prov
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in “business to business” calli
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MATCHED PAIR SAMPLE The purpose of
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The second part of the visit requir
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epresentative of a known population
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51 Table 3.7 Postcard survey statis
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Table 3.8 Comparison of annual wate
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postcard survey. Nevertheless, exam
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confidence interval ranged from 49.
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particular property (e.g., the mont
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State PUC officials - water commiss
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10. The PROPID number appearing on
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These costs represent the commodity
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The postcard survey provided inform
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Table 4.4 Average number of units f
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Two-thirds of the properties that r
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Percent of Surveyed Properties with
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$700 Average Rent Per Bedroom ($) $
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Percent of Surveyed Properties with
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Impact properties were also more li
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Table 4.8 Issues considered before
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Percent of Surveyed Impact Properti
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60% Percent of Surveyed Properties
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From the visits, it was found that
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100% Percent of Surveyed Residents
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Roughly similar proportions of resi
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inserts for toilets (21%) or low-fl
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proportion were unsure, 37% from su
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Table 4.18 Ownership and rental rat
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Figure 4.17 Submeter water bill #1
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wastewater rates are not shown so t
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Figure 4.23 Hot water hybrid water
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RUBS Sample Bills Seven sample RUBS
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wastewater rates are not shown so t
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Figure 4.28 RUBS water bill #4 from
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Figure 4.30 RUBS water bill #6 RUBS
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directly to and then paid by the th
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never subtracting for common area w
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Late Fees At the start of water bil
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124
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intuitively clear, and matches comm
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Indoor water use was normalized on
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Table 5.3 Summarized water use anal
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easonable assumption since there is
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Figure 5.1 shows the frequency dist
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40 Difference in Annual Water Use p
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after 1995. By including only those
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Table 5.11 Statistical tests compar
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Factors that Influence Water Use Th
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Table 5.12 Association of categoric
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Indoor Water Use per Unit in 2001 I
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Table 5.13 Continuous factors from
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Multivariate Models to Determine Im
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properties built before 1995 were c
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A = Beta coefficient for “Propert
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substantially reduces the sample si
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Table 5.17 Model #2 coefficients an
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0.00 indicating that whatever fit d
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commodity charge for water and wast
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properties having generally lower w
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110 Average Annual Water Use Per Un
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analysis, intended to control best
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Table 5.27 Paired samples test, all
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Table 5.30 Estimated water use befo
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Table 5.33 Comparison of water savi
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180
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sector only reduced usage by 18% (A
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Table 6.1 Avoided costs from submet
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submetered. Complete responses of c
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included in this cost/benefit analy
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Table 6.3 Cost and benefit for owne
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Perceived Concerns In the resident
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With a service fee, residents could
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Table 6.4 Economic return for a res
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ANALYSIS OF PRICE ELASTICITIES Econ
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concluded that if a single elastici
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esults from this analysis point to
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over which they have control than d
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According to the basic consumer cho
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The consumer choice problem can be
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210
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water systems from compliance with
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and methods of practice. NIST publi
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Table 7.1 NSUAA Summary of State Re
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New Surveys of State Agencies and W
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the AWWA WaterStats 1999 database.
Page 274 and 275: Measures, which dispatches a public
Page 276 and 277: Mississippi, Missouri, Pennsylvania
Page 278 and 279: 226 Table 7.6 Summary of utility re
Page 280 and 281: DISCUSSION - KEY EXAMPLES OF STATE
Page 282 and 283: ill. Condominium associations are g
Page 284 and 285: under construction after January 1,
Page 286 and 287: Weights and Measures Regulation In
Page 288 and 289: from the submetering. Meter testing
Page 290 and 291: clean and decent housing or the lac
Page 292 and 293: 240
Page 294 and 295: NATIONAL ORGANIZATIONAL STRUCTURE F
Page 296 and 297: complaints in all 50 states and app
Page 298 and 299: - Meters must demonstrate in testin
Page 300 and 301: - Plumbing systems are space constr
Page 302 and 303: (2) Twisted or kinked flex supply l
Page 304 and 305: 252
Page 306 and 307: Estimated Water Use By Different Bi
Page 308 and 309: there are clear benefits to these s
Page 310 and 311: study site. These values were then
Page 312 and 313: immediately strengthens the owner's
Page 314 and 315: among the nation's key strategies f
Page 316 and 317: all repair and replacement decision
Page 318 and 319: These findings underscore the obser
Page 320 and 321: varies with volume of use) for mult
Page 322 and 323: Recommendation 6 - Efficient plumbi
Page 326 and 327: individual unit, the volume allocat
Page 328 and 329: RECOMMENDATIONS FOR FURTHER RESEARC
Page 330 and 331: Fixed rates - Part of a master mete
Page 332 and 333: Total-capture submetering - a type
Page 334 and 335: 282
Page 336 and 337: Corral, L.R. 1997. Price and Non-Pr
Page 338 and 339: McClelland, L. 1980. Encouraging En
Page 340: Young, C.E., K.R. Kinsley and W.E.
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