Although the city of New Orleans has had its fair share of drama regarding its water bills over the years with the use of estimates rather than actual meter readings that leaves the residents with higher bills, the city claims that they are doing their best to ensure that their system doesn’t do overestimate a client’s reading.
That said, let’s look at the rates charged by the New Orleans Sewerage and Water Board. The board has about 136,000 customers who get billed each month. The board uses a tiered rate system to calculate the residential water bills. The charge which is based on a per-1,000 gallon (kilogallon) increases with each tier.
The water quantity charge that you see on your bill is usually calculated on the amount of water each household uses each month. The volume of water used is also listed on the bill along with the actual meter reading if indeed a meter reading was done by an employee or then an estimated one. You also get your water usage for the previous month on your bill as well as last year’s bill at the same time of the year.
With that, you are able to see whether your usage is increasing or decreasing. The rates below are based on the cost of treating the water that you use in your house. For every first 3,000 gallons, you pay $4.79, next 17,000 gallons costs $8.15, next 980,000 gallons costs $6.41 and over 1,000,000 gallons costs $5.37. For wholesale customers, their entire usage costs $5.13. Keep in mind that the water quantity rates are usually billed per 1000 gallons of use.
Water and Sewer Ready to Charge Rates
The water and sewer ready to serve charge rates found on your water bill is ideally the fixed cost for billing, collecting and servicing your account. Both charges depend on the size of your water meter and are usually billed even if no water was used. For most households, they usually have a 5/8-inch or 3/4 -inch connection. These are billed separately for both water charge and sewer charge.
For a meter size amount of 5/8 inch, ¾ inch, 1 inch, 11/2 inches, 2 inches, 3 inches, 4 inches, 6 inches, 8 inches, 10 inches, 12 inches and 15 inches, the water charge is $6.53, $7.99, $10.14, $16.74, $22.07, $49.93, $86.97, $170.72, $252.86, $343.04, $402.63 and $532.29 respectively.
For a meter size of amount of 5/8 inch, ¾ inch, 1 inch, 11/2 inches, 2 inches, 3 inches, 4 inches, 6 inches, 8 inches, 10 inches, 12 inches and 15 inches, the sewer charge is $18.68, $26.59, $37.85, $69.66, $101.87, $241.58, $402.63, $805.26, $1,207.89, $1,610.51, $1,852.09and $2,496.30.
As is evident, the higher the inch of your water meter, the higher you will pay for both the water charge and sewer charge. While the water usage charge above is calculated by multiplying the per gallon rates by the water usage the sewer volume charge for residential customers is billed for their sewer use based on 85 percent of the water that they use during the billing period. However, commercial and industrial customers get billed the while 100 percent of the water they use.
This article brought to you by your premier plumbing service in NOLA, New Orlean’s Plumber Pros.