Water Leak Write-Off

Waitomo District Council encourages customers to check for leaks regularly including through reading your water meter and keeping a log of use to monitor any significant changes to your water use. You can apply for a water leak write off if you’ve identified a leak and had it repaired in a timely manner. WDC will consider writing off a portion of the leak to acknowledge efforts made to minimise water wastage.

Guidelines

Purpose

The purpose of these guidelines is to assist people in situations where out of the ordinary water user charges have been incurred because of a water leak.

Conditions and criteria

The property owner (or authorised agent) must make an application to Council for consideration.

Council is satisfied a leak on the property past the point of supply has contributed to out of the ordinary water user charges. Council is satisfied the leak has been repaired appropriately and within one month of being identified (unless evidence is provided that the services of an appropriate repairer could not be obtained within this period). Proof of the leak being repaired has been provided to Council with the application.

A water leak write off for any particular property will generally only be granted once within a two year period. Any subsequent application for another write off within that period will be determined at the full discretion of the Council.

Relief will be provided by writing off 75% of the water use estimated to be attributed to the leak for the first application within a calendar year.

A volume equal to the 25% of the estimated leak portion will be added to the average usage to partially recover the cost of supply.

The water use attributed to leak will be determined by calculating the difference between the average consumption of the property, as determined using the formula for estimating consumption prescribed under Clause 11.8.1 of the Water Services Bylaw 2015, and the consumption over and above that average for the relevant billing period.