Smart Water Meters Resolve Billing Challenges for Water Utilities

Smart Water Meters Resolve Billing Challenges for Water Utilities

In the past, the mere mention of door-to-door water fee collection was met with displeasure by both utility staff and residents, simply because of the immense hassle involved.

For residents, home collection presented two main issues: difficulty in discerning the authenticity of the collecting staff, and significant safety concerns. Consequently, many users refused to open their doors to bill collectors.

For utility staff, not only did they have to endure suspicious looks and frequent door-slams, but the greatest fear was encountering "deadbeat" users—those who habitually defaulted on or unreasonably refused to pay their water bills. That was where the real trouble began!

For a fee that was clearly due, these individuals would act as if payment were a huge act of charity. Particularly, some older individuals or those with low ethical standards would resort to crying, throwing tantrums, or engaging in all manner of extreme behavior.

Worse still, there were incidents of staff being chased off with brooms, meters being secretly tampered with, personnel being bribed, and, unbelievably, staff being falsely accused of causing an accident or being victims of counter-accusations.

One might find these accounts sensational, but the world is vast and full of strange things. There are indeed some people who disregard public order and morality or violate the law over the minor cost of water bills.

These actions created significant distress for water utilities. Failure to collect fees is no small matter and can lead to substantial economic losses for the water supply department.

However, these situations began to improve after 2008.

This turnaround was partly due to the cancellation of door-to-door collection policies, but more significantly, it was driven by the emergence of the smart water meter.

Smart meters feature a developed pre-payment function specifically designed to address the issues mentioned above. Each time a user consumes water, the smart meter calculates the cost and automatically deducts the corresponding amount from the user’s designated account.

If the account lacks sufficient funds to cover the water usage, the user must first top up the account before water service can resume normally. This innovation not only reduced labor costs for the water utility but also made a considerable contribution to effective fee collection.

It is due to this functionality that the sales of smart water meters have continuously grown, making them the most popular type of water meter on the market today.