Patricia Ann Dailey went to a recent meeting clutching a file folder filled with printouts of her water bills, pictures of the water meter in her yard and correspondence with Birmingham Water Works staff.

After four trips to the utility’s customer service center, she had gotten her bills, including one for $620, corrected, but she said she went to the Water Works Board meeting to speak for others who receive inaccurate bills and aren’t able to take the actions she did.

“I’ve always been an advocate for people,” Dailey said. “My heart goes out to the elderly people that cannot go out and read their meter.”

Darryl Jones, interim general manager for Birmingham Water Works, pointed to Dailey’s bill having been corrected as proof the utility works with customers to rectify billing problems.

With more than 200,000 meters to read in Birmingham Water Works’ five-county area, “we’re going to have some issues,” Jones said. “We’re not perfect by any means. What it shows is that we’re committed to making those solutions for people.”

Jones said customers who can’t come to the Water Works’ customer service office the way Dailey did can have their billing discrepancies resolved by phone.

“You can call our main number and talk to our agents, and we’re going to work with a bill that just doesn’t make sense,” Jones said.

Dailey said those instructions didn’t work for her.

“That’s kind of like a joke,” she said.

Dailey is a retired nurse who takes care of her father, who had a stroke in October. That same month, her typical water bill of approximately $80 per month increased to $206. The following month, it spiked to $620. Both times, she read her own meter and notified Birmingham Water Works the purported usage was inaccurate.

Dailey said her situation began to turn around when she met in person with Water Works employee Joi Delaney. Dailey said she showed her bills and photos of her meter, and Delaney agreed the usage amounts did not match and the bills were wrong. Dailey’s next bill still included a $37 charge for rereading her meter. Delaney helped Dailey resolve that issue as well, but Dailey said it required another in-person visit to the Water Works’ office.

“I don’t want to have to come back down here next month for a false reading again,” she said. “I have a sick father, and I don’t have time to just keep coming down here.”

Long-Running Problem

Birmingham Water Works customers frequently voice concerns about excessive and missing bills and unread meters.

Jefferson County Commissioner Sheila Tyson said residents have been complaining about unreasonable water bills for 15 years, and she began receiving multiple phone calls per week from constituents after she began looking into complaints earlier this year.

In October, Water Works executives reported recent billing department improvements had reduced the number of implausible readings — those outside of normal parameters for their respective accounts — from 25,230 in July to 13,121 in September. They also said the number of bills estimated because meters weren’t read fell, from 8,430 in July to 1,263 in September. When water utilities are not able to read meters every month, they often use estimated billing instead.

The Water Works policy is to reread meters when the system flags an implausible reading, Jones said, which can result in delayed bills.

The drops in estimated bills and implausible readings have been attributed to the leadership of Jones, who began serving in the role in June, and four interim managers the utility appointed in September.

Automated Meter-Reading System

An automated meter-reading system slated to be operational in 2028 is expected to solve many issues related to unread meters and inaccurate readings. The 2025 budget the Birmingham Water Works Board approved last month includes $10 million to begin buying the meters needed to shift to an automated system. It also includes a 4.9% rate increase for residential customers.

At the Dec. 11 meeting, the board approved a $7.96 million consulting agreement with E Source as a consultant to assist with the transition to automated meter reading.

“E Source is a company we’ve been looking at to help us get into that advanced metering,” Jones said. “It’s more than just the meter itself, as well as other things that go along with it that will enhance billing and customer support.”

All meters in the Water Works’ system currently have to be manually read.

“So the meters that we’re going to replace them with will be able to transmit their reading signal, and we’ll be able to capture that and then generate bills from there,” Jones said. “They (E Source) are the company that’s going to help us get the right selection of software, hardware, network, everything that we need to make it work. They’ve done this with other utilities, and they’re going to help us make sure we get the right system and the right processes in place.”

Utility Concerns Widespread

Our local reporting partner WBHM for a year conducted a regular series highlighting unreasonable utility bills in the Gulf South. One of those stories focused on Birmingham resident Claire Ahalt, who, after a meter misreading one month followed by a missing bill the next, eventually received a bill for $7,000. She hired a plumber who discovered a massive leak under her front yard. Birmingham Water Works later cleared the charges.

In another case, a couple got a bill for almost $20,000 when they developed a leak that went undetected and unbilled for at least two months. They wound up settling the bill for about $4,000.

It also delved into the reasons electricity bills were so high in the winter, laying most of the blame at the feet of Alabama Power and the Alabama Public Service Commission, which is tasked with regulating utility companies.

You can read the full series here.