standing and sewerage charges

[borntosuffer1967]

yesterday i recieved my quarterly water bill and the amount i was charged for my water usage was £31.51 which is not too bad i think.

but i have long noticed that what causes my bills to go up is the so called standing and sewerage charges.

the standing charge for the water is £14.10( what is that charge for?

and the sewerage charge is £18.69

plus £23.50 which altogether brings my bill to a whopping £87.80

despite the fact that the water i used amounted to only £31.51.

how does three valleys water justify that?

i just feel it is all a bit excessive and i wonder if they really need to be burdening us with all these charges?

why should we pay for the cost of maintaining the water and sewerage networks?

if we own then by all means we should maintain it, but if we don't then why are we paying for it?

as far as i know those things belong to the companies that own them, so why dont they pay for it rather than making us pay?

and how can ofwat approve of such a thing?

don't they realise that those charges are excessive and cause hardship for many people?

making the companies that own the water and sewerage networks pay for the upkeep of their property, would relive many people from the financial burden of paying excessive water and sewerage standing charges.

which would then mean that people could save money that could help them to pay other bills etc.

is it not possible for ofwat to approve of a badly needed

change in that regard?

[citizenkain]

Your bill is made up of the water you use,also a small amount for the maintenance of the water system,pipes,purification etc,the amount you pay in sewarage is relevant to how much water you use as once you have used it,it goes into the sewage system to be processed etc

[MrMT]

I recently undertook trials to reduce my water consumption and am pleased to see I was only billed £6 for water and £11 standing charge (£17 total). This is a lot lower than I'm used to saying so my experiment has paid off. I expected the soon to follow sewage bill to equally low, but no, it's more!

 

I'm billed £9 for sewage disposal and £21 for standing charge!

 

I agree with the OP, it's not on. Even more painful is I live a mere 2 miles from the stink farm!

 

Is there not an alternative, lower cost service I can request - I considered calling them for advise but doubt it'll do any good as no company wants to reduce it's income, do they?