Water companies have different ways for determining assessed charges. Some base the charges on the type of property you live in:
Flat/Terrace/Maisonette ( Rate 1 )
Semi Detached ( Rate 2 )
Detached property ( Rate 3)
Some companies use a flat charge based on the average household bill:
The company will have a monitoring scheme running on some of the properties they supply which gives them the average usage in there area.
You can contact your water supplier and apply to join the monitoring scheme and may get you a reduction in your bill if you are selected to join.
Some use occupancy based charges so the bill will be based on the amount of people that live in the property.
Finally some charge based on an assessment of the customer’s usage:
You will be asked how many showers,Baths,washing machine loads per week are used at the property.
Some water companies now do a single occupier tariff for people that live alone, this makes things a little easier for people who live alone in 3 bedroom houses that can not have a meter fitted.
The surface water drainage charges are based upon a banded annual charge determined by the property type i.e. detached, semi-detached or flat/terraced.
If you have requested to have a water meter fitted at your property but could not have one fitted, contact your water supplier to discuss Assessed charges as an alternative.