All Forum Posts by: Dominick Petrellese

The new meter has been fine. We average around 80-120 gallons per day and with the warmer weather finally arriving I suspect it will be higher. The new meter is digital - not a smart meter. Heaven knows what could go wrong with this but I suspect with no moving gears or flaps like an analog meter it should be fine. Our old analog meter was working fine when it was taken for testing and it was found to be too slow. I find that this was an exercise in futility because those meters will never show that the numbers jumped with a flow test unless a mechanical test is performed. It only firms up the utility's case against you. It's like a bug in a spiders web - they never win.

 Nathan thanks so much for your input. We have low flush toilets so no flappers are involved here. I almost wish we had a leak or flood (god forbid!) so that the problem could be rectified. To put it to you another way, if we went to bed and took a photo of our water meter, then woke up the next day and took another photo which shows 20,000 gallons of water was used overnight, we'd be liable because we have no proof that something didn't happened that we weren't aware of. Short of having a video camera watching the meter 24/7, there's no proof because the meter is never wrong. Even then I wonder if they will find a way to discredit that. Something is very wrong and you're are right we have already lost this appeal without any consideration to the logic and common sense. I would think its not worth pursuing from a legal standpoint. Small claims court perhaps but is it worth it? After living in this town for 38 years and doing countless hours of volunteer service, we and our plumber are liars!! But we will continue the fight. Bottom line....watch your meters like a hawk!

 Thanks Ray. Crazy that a toilet would run for a year without being fixed immediately.

 I think you're right Ray and we'll continue to pursue this. Local news media are interested in the story so we'll see. Thanks for the reach out.

 We've lived here for 38 years and the previous "regime" would have at least try to work with us. These folks are ruthless. I've heard that the environment at the municipality is toxic but I have nothing to substantiate that claim. In our meeting with the mayor and councilman they said someone else got a $3,000 bill. Is that supposed to make us feel better? They claimed that they had 10 visitors in their home and may have showered every day. In my mind that still does not equate to using a few million gallons of water. Even a leaky toilet (not running but trickling) would not warrant that amount.

 They are not offering any relief other than tack on daily interest to the remaining amount. The Mayor and Council stand behind the Business Administrator who won't budge an inch. They claim they don't want to set a precedent but to me its applying common sense and logic - we are certain we did not use that amount of water. I have to ask if they don't want to set a precedent then how many others in this small town are experiencing the same issue? We live in a small town, not rural, next to a large University. Thanks for the reach out.

Thank you for adding me to your group! 

We are a retired couple, empty nesters, living in New Jersey. In February 2023 we received an outrageously large quarterly water and sewer bill from our municipal water utility for the winter period November 14, 2022 - February 9, 2023. The $1,400.00 bill reflects our usage to have been 624,000 gallons of water. We contacted the utility department in town immediately and the clerk suggested we check the numbers on the meter and walked us through doing that. The numbers were close to the reading on the bill, and the difference indicated that the water seemed to be flowing normally. The clerk confirmed this fact. She suggested that we must have had a leak or running toilets, leaking faucets, etc.

There was never a leak or breakage in our home during that time. Our plumbing fixtures are all in fine working order, nothing leaking or running. All of our outside water sources were turned off from inside in October. No one had access to our home during the times we were away. Our long time sole master plumber gave us a notarized letter stating that our plumbing is sound and no repairs were done in our home during this billing period.

To show good faith we paid the utility $200, the amount we paid for the same billing period a year ago. We feel this is probably more than we would have used considering we were away for several weeks during this time. We are disputing the remaining balance.

We were advised by the utility department to have the meter tested in order to dispute the bill. They removed the meter and sent it for a water flow test. The results indicated that the meter was running slowly during low water flow, resulting in a lower than normal billing. HA!

After several emails to the Mayor, Council, tax collector and utility department, we received a call from the Borough Business Administrator who insists that something happened that we are unaware of. Well maybe that something that we're all unaware of is that the meter, which has analog numbers, (and has since been replaced due to the fact of running slowly) went haywire mechanically. During this period PSE&G had been working in our town to update the gas meters both in the street and in our home. The gas meter is near the water meter in our basement and when they were done installing the new gas meter there was concrete all over the floor from drilling. Could the drilling have caused the meter to “jump”?

We have been monitoring our usage daily since the first call to the utility. Our water usage reads between 80 and 100 gallons daily.

All we are asking is that they apply common sense to this issue. The meter was never tested for mechanical problems. If we had a leak of this magnitude our home would sink or there would be serious internal damage. How can a plumbing problem just fix itself? We would appreciate any help or advice in helping us resolve this problem. After reading many posts on this great forum apparently this happens a great deal throughout the country and local municipalities are getting away with it. It's called LEGALIZED THIEVERY. Thank you in advance for your input.

Dom