Using water will cost more when summer heat is on
Customers furious after being put on trial pricing plan that charges more when demand is greatest
HOUSEHOLDS will be charged more for heavy water use during the summer months under trials to encourage them to turn off the taps.
South West Water is running a twoyear trial involving 3,500 metered households, who will be moved on to new tariffs from Oct 1.
Households in the pilot will be charged up to three times more for heavy water consumption in summer, when supply is under strain. However, their winter bills will be cheaper.
The company is responding to calls by Ofwat, the regulator, to trial ways to cut customer usage, as the Government seeks to reduce water consumption by 20 per cent by 2038.
But customers expressed anger at being automatically enrolled in the trial by South West Water, which has been under fire in recent months for contaminated water and pollution incidents.
The company was forced to issue an apology after a parasite contamination left more than 100 people unwell and a boil notice in place for weeks in the town of Brixham in Devon. In 2023, it was the worst-performing company in terms of sewage pollution incidents, according to the Environment Agency.
The company reported a nearly 25 per cent increase in leakage from 2021 to 2022, the highest in the sector.
Water companies have been criticised for failing to build new infrastructure, such as reservoirs and pipes, to protect supply, but argue they have not been given the backing of Ofwat or local planning authorities.
South West Water said the new pricing trial would be “kind to the environment” by protecting reservoirs and fair to customers who could save money by using less water.
It recommends measures such as turning off the tap while brushing your teeth or using a rain butt to collect water for garden plants.
The company says it will consider concerns from those who “feel like you cannot be part of the trial due to financial concerns, you’re moving house or you have a health condition that would be exacerbated by being on the trial”.
But customers have reported that South West Water has denied requests to remove them from the trial.
Chris Weatherly, from Falmouth, criticised the trial after he was enrolled without his consent. “Without any consultation with me, I’m being used as a sort of lab rat for their experiment,” he
‘Without any consultation with me, I’m being used as a sort of lab rat for this company’s experiment’
told news website Cornwall Live. “How can a regulated supplier of a vital public commodity such as water force some of its customers, but not others in the same circumstances, to pay a charge for their water that is different from the standard tariff, without getting the customer’s consent?”
Last year, Affinity Water began a twoyear trial charging customers more as their usage increased. Northumbrian Water has said it plans to roll out a “water-saving tariff ”, which will reward customers for reducing consumption.
A spokesman for South West Water said: “Our customers have told us they want us to find new ways of charging and we want to make sure that the bills our customers pay are fair and reflect their usage. We are trialling two new innovative tariffs from Oct 1 to understand what works well and what our customers consider to be fair.”