New Orleans Sewerage & Water Board in negotiations with Aqua-Metric for smart meters to eliminate billing errors

NEW ORLEANS (WGNO)— Frustration over inaccurate water bills and misread meters in New Orleans could be a thing of the past. The Sewerage & Water Board is negotiating with a company called “Aqua-Metric” to use radio technology to read the meters in real-time.

“We all have to live. We want to live comfortable,” Hollygrove Resident Brenda Robinson said.

It has been uncomfortable for folks like Brenda Robinson who lives in Hollygrove—not knowing how much her water bill will be month-to-month, especially when there are billing errors.

“Say for instance, $150 this month and then next month it is $500. We are in tough times. No one has the money to up and pay that bill,” she said.

There’s hope in sight now that the New Orleans Sewerage & Water Board is negotiating with “Aqua-Metric” to install a smart meter system for customers like Brenda to help eliminate those mistakes.

“We know billing issues have been more than frustrating for our customers and they deserve better,” Ghassan Korban, Executive Director of Sewerage & Water Board said.

The smart meters will collect customer’s water use information in real-time and send it directly to Sewerage & Water Board’s billing system.

“Those meters will be replaced or retrofitted to be able to emit actual reads through a network of poles and wireless technology,” Korban said.

The 140-thousand water meters citywide will no longer be out-of-date needing to be read manually by meter readers.

Korban says that the “Aqua-Metric” smart meters are 99 percent accurate.

And that’s what folks like Brenda want to hear.

“We want to get along with Sewerage & Water Board,” she said.

The plan is to roll out the smart meters in phases over the next three years. They will start with certain neighborhoods and they hope to do that later this year.

In a statement from “Aqua-Metric,” they say they are grateful for the opportunity to become a partner.