Water Problem

Since moving to Nevada over two years ago, we have always thought that our water bills were really high. Dan has even called to discuss our bill a time or two, but was informed that we live in the dessert and that the city water department never makes mistakes. Needless to say we had been unsuccessful in solving this problem until now.

We finally got the so called "smoking gun" that we needed to prove our case. Our water bill showed that we didn't use any water last month. This was totally impossible since we were home all month.

So this gave Dan a reason to pull the lid of our water meter.
This is what he found.....Notice how the meter on the left has a lock on it. Our next door neighbor's house is in foreclosure, so their water has been shut off and the meter has been locked.

This is what the locked meter reads (658,xxx) -- which happens to match the total on our bill.
This is what the other meter says (301,xxx).....

Come to find out the reason our bill has been so high, was that it wasn't our bill, it was our neighbors. They had several adults living there throughout the two years, they watered their lawn several time a day if not a week, plus they had a spa that they would refill on a routine basis. There is an obvious twist in the wires, but the city is claiming a typo. They said that every meter has an ID code, kind of like a VIN on a car, and it was entered into their computer wrong. So when this lady gets back from training in another week she will be going through both sets of bills to figure out the difference and give us a credit. We informed her we want a check, not a credit on our account. She said she'll see what she can do.

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For my neighbors who read this you might want to check your meter if you think your bills are too high, especially if you share a box. The city has eluded to there being problems in this neighborhood.

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On a positive, it looks like it will be a nice Christmas after all.