Water Charges
Council operates 11 water supplies: 3 urban, 5 rural residential and 3 farming supplies. These supplies do not receive any funds from general rates. They must collect enough revenue from water charges to cover all costs.
Council has two methods for charging for water use:
- Unmetered properties receive a set uniform annual charge (UAC) which is included with the property rate charges.
- Metered properties receive separate quarterly invoices, based on the actual volume of water consumed.
Unmetered properties
Domestic properties within the Rotorua urban fence that are less than 2000 square metres in area are not metered for water usage (with a few exceptions). These properties receive a uniform annual charge.
Exceptions to this include properties that have more than two dwellings under the same ownership, and properties outside of the urban water supply boundaries (extra-territorial properties).
Metered properties
All water connections within the rural supplies are metered, as are all extraordinary water connections in the urban area. The meters are read physically in August, November, February and May.
An extraordinary water connection is one that serves a commercial or industrial property, serves more than two domestic dwellings or where there is usage that falls outside the definition of ordinary use – for example, geothermal water heat exchanging or hot pool cooling.
Metered charges
All water consumed is charged at a set rate per cubic metre.
Some supplies have a minimum quarterly charge to ensure sufficient revenue to cover the costs of supplying the water.
Most rural supplies do not have a set minimum charge. Rather, each connection receives a supply charge for fixed costs and a consumption charge for water consumed. This system ensures that large and small consumers pay equal shares of the fixed costs of operating and maintaining the supply.
The supply charge is calculated by dividing the fixed costs by the number of consumers. Fixed costs are those which do not change in relation to how much water is used.
Consumption charges relate only to the costs incurred in supplying the water - the variable costs. These are electricity, chlorine, plus a small allowance for wear and tear on mechanical equipment.