Your water meter

Your water meter is usually just inside the front boundary of your property. You’ll recognise it as a low metal pipe structure with a tap handle or lever at one end and a meter dial in the middle. Remember to keep your meter and frame clear of leaves and garden debris as we need to have easy access to it. The area above and below as well as around you meter and frame should have a 15 cm (minimum) clearance of hazards such as concrete, dirt, shrubs or trees.

If you live in a unit of large buildings the water meter may be found in the utilities cupboard on each floor, or at the front of the property in smaller buildings.

If you need help locating your water meter, please contact us.

We read your water meter every four months (i.e. three times a year). The number of days between these meter reads read may differ as we don't read your meter on exactly the same dates each billing cycle.

This can be due to operational reasons or other factors, including bad weather, locked gates or a dog on your property. This means that the number of days you are charged for your water and sewerage services can vary slightly, affecting the amount on your bill.

If we were unable to access your meter, we leave an Unable to Read Meter Card (see image) in your letterbox seeking you provide us with an urgent meter reading. You can provide us with a meter reading by using our online form.

We may not be able to read your meter if it's behind a locked gate or unsafe to enter the property. Hazards that may prevent our meter readers accessing the meter include:

• there is a dog
• overgrown garden or grass
• buried in concrete or dirt

If we do not obtain a meter reading your water usage will be estimated based on previous actual water meter readings.

We try our best to to read every meter. However, sometimes circumstances prevent us from obtaining a meter read and we will need to estimate the read. An estimate is based on the property's previous usage pattern. For future readings, an actual meter reading will try to be obtained again, and if successful the actual usage is taken and billed to ensure the customer has only been billed for what they have used.

Estimates are done when:

• we can not access the water meter (i.e. meter is located behind locked gate, under bushes or a dog on premises),
• the meter is damaged and dials are not readable;
• the meter has stopped working and is not recording water passing through the meter, and
• the meter cannot be located.

We provide residents of strata and community title properties with the option to have separate metering. This means, each owner will pay for the water they actually use rather than a percentage apportionment of the total usage based on unit entitlement.

Once you receive your bill from Hunter Water, you can compare the meter reading shown on the back of your water bill (page 2), to the black numbers contained within the dial on your water meter.

As the meter was read a number of days ago, the numbers on the meter dial are likely to be slightly higher than what is shown on the bill.

There are different types of water meters across the region. The black numbers on your water meter represent kilolitres (kL). One kilolitre (kL) equals 1000 litres (L).

We use the black numbers to calculate the water usage on your bill.

You need to tell us the reading within three days if we've left a self-reading card. Otherwise we'll need to estimate your water use based on your past patterns.

If you've read the meter yourself, you can:

• Submit your reading online
• call us on 1300 657 657 Monday to Friday between 9 am and 5 pm
• post the card back to us.