Sep 24, 2009 7:16 pm US/Central
Error Dramatically Inflates Woman's Water Bill
City Official Says Computer 'Glitch' Is To Blame For Charging Resident $1,500 Instead Of $211
CHICAGO (CBS) ―
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Chicago resident Lillian Templeton has seen her city water bills increase dramatically -- in error. An official says a computer glitch has inflated her meter readings.
CBS
Have you checked your water bill?
The city has a new electronic way of reading your meter. But guess what? You could be overcharged hundreds of dollars, because of a new computer billing glitch.
The city is in the midst of a multi-million-dollar project to bring water-meter reading and billing into the electronic age.
More than 100,000 meters have been equipped with electronic devices that allow for drive-by readings. But as 2 Investigator Pam Zekman reports, computer glitches have created a meter mess and billing nightmare for some property owners.
Last December, an electronic water meter-reading device was installed at a three-flat at 3835 North Central Park owned by 85-year-old Lillian Templeton. After the installation, her water bills began to jump from an average of about $150 every two months to more than $1,300.
"I was flabbergasted, I couldn't understand what was going on," Templeton said.
At first, the city's water department said her meter was running continuously and that she should hire a licensed plumber to repair any leaks.
A friend of Templeton's, Dennis Syverson, met with a plumber. They only found a slow drip in a sink in the basement. The plumber fixed it and said there was no way that small leak was responsible for the skyrocketing water bill.
After that minor repair, the bill didn't go down -- it went up to more than $1,500. Templeton said she's been told you would have to fill a swimming pool every day to generate that kind of bill.
The plumber came out again and talked with Syverson.
"He thought it was the calibration or this electronic thing, when they're reading it. It's coming up wrong," he said.
Syverson then made numerous calls to the water department seeking help for Templeton.
"They always said, 'Our supervisor will call you,' and no supervisor ever called," Templeton said.
CBS 2 showed Templeton's bill to Chicago City Water Commissioner John Spatz, asking how the bill could suddenly jump to $1,300 and $1,500. Zekman also asked why the people answering the phones at the department didn't realize there was something wrong with that.
"They should have done something, in my opinion, they should have followed up," Spatz said.
When he looked into the bill, he found out there was an installation error with the electronic device. The repair prompted a computer input error, which then created the billing error.
"It's basically kind of a computer glitch," Spatz said.
Some glitch. As a result, the water-usage amount was not converted from the old measurement of cubic feet to gallons by the city's billing computers. That resulted in the bill becoming 7.5 times higher than it should have been, Spatz said.
Templeton's $1,500 bill should have been $211.
"If they had just told us what the problem was, I wouldn't have gotten so upset," she said.
"I understand her frustration," Spatz said. "I have a mother in her eighties. I hate to put anyone through that."
In the end, Templeton got a hand-delivered refund check for more than $1,600. She planned to put it in the bank.
The water commissioner claims that so far it's only happened to about 140 property owners and they have also gotten refunds.
Now he has staff double-checking for any of the computer input errors that created the billing error.
(© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
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