Metered Utilities: Billing Tenants for Electricity and Water

Reading the meters is the easy part. A clipboard, a lap of the park, a number off each dial. It's what happens back at the desk that eats the evening: last quarter's reading subtracted from this one, times the rate, plus the supply charge for the right number of days, for every site. Then an invoice for each tenant. Then the phone call from site 14, because two digits got swapped and their bill tripled.

If you on-sell electricity or water to your long-stay tenants, that evening is what metered utilities in Camper BMS is built to take off you. You bring the readings. It does the arithmetic, keeps the working, and has a bill waiting for each tenant.

One thing up front: this is part of leases. Bills go to the tenant holding a metered site, as separate invoices beside their rent. Casual bookings are not metered.

Everything below is about what you charge your tenants. It has nothing to do with what Camper BMS charges you, which is set out on the pricing page.

Your state may regulate what a park can charge tenants for utilities and how long they have to pay. Check the rules that apply to your park before you set a rate or the days to pay, and ask your accountant which GST treatment applies to each utility you pass on.

The typo that turns into a phone call

A wrong bill can start very small: a dropped digit, two swapped, a reading typed into the wrong row. The cheapest place to catch it is before it is saved, so that is where the checks are.

As you type each reading, the usage since the last one shows under the box. If site 9 normally uses a few hundred kWh and the screen says 4,000, you see it while the clipboard is still in your hand. Anything that looks wrong for that meter is flagged in orange: usage more than three times its usual daily rate, usage on a site with nobody on it, or a tenanted site that has used nothing for over a month.

A flag is a question, and sometimes the answer is "yes, really". The reading still saves. Type why in the note box, "new air conditioner" say, and the note stays with the reading for when someone asks in six months.

The walk itself is still a walk, but you can print a reading sheet to take with you: every site with its tenant, meter number and last reading, and a blank column for the new figure. A reading lower than the last one is refused, which catches the figure typed against the wrong site. The exception is a meter that has been swapped or has rolled over. Mark it as replaced, add the old meter's final reading if you have it, and the old meter's last units are billed while the new one starts fresh.

The tenant who leaves in week six

Quarterly billing is tidy until someone moves out in the middle of a quarter. Now one meter's usage belongs to two people, and the supply charge has to be split by days.

Read the meter on the day they leave. That reading closes their final bill, which is ready to issue on the spot, and opens the next tenant's. Each pays for exactly what they used, and the supply charge for their own days.

Put the final reading on your move-out checklist, next to the keys. It takes a minute on the day, and both tenants are billed from a real reading.

The rate rise that lands mid-quarter

Your retailer puts the price up on 1 July. Your last reading was in late June and the next is in September. Which bills get the new rate?

You save the new rate with the date it applies from, and one rule covers it: a bill closed by a reading on or after that date uses the new rate. A bill read on 28 June keeps the old one. A bill read on 28 September gets the new one. Invoices you have already issued keep the rate they were billed at, and the earlier rates stay listed, so you can always see what was charged when.

The rates themselves are what you would expect: a price per kWh or per kL, to four decimal places if your tariff needs it, entered GST-inclusive. The supply charge is optional. Make it per day, like an energy retailer's, or a fixed amount per bill, like a water service charge. Each rate is saved as either standard GST or GST-free, and which one applies is the question for your accountant.

You are not locked into quarters

A bill runs from the day after the meter's last billed reading to the day of the new one, the way a retailer's does. Read on 30 June and again on 28 September and the bill covers 1 July to 28 September, 90 days.

That means the calendar is yours. Read quarterly, monthly, or whenever you get to it. Each bill picks up where the last one stopped, so nothing is billed twice. If a bill is too small to bother sending, leave it. It grows with the next reading, so one invoice covers everything since the last.

A bill the tenant can check themselves

The quickest way to settle a billing query is for the tenant to be able to do the sum. So the invoice shows its working, laid out the way a retailer's bill is: usage at the rate, the supply or service charge, GST and the total as labelled lines. Under them sit the site, the meter number, the billing period and its days, the previous and current readings with their dates, and the average use and cost per day.

Before anything goes out, Preview opens the PDF exactly as the tenant will see it, without creating an invoice or emailing anyone. Issue sends one bill. Issue all sends every bill that is ready, after you confirm. If a tenant is owed something, a credit goes on as its own named line, "Concession rebate" for 25.00 for example, and the total and its GST adjust to match.

You set the days to pay, 28 unless you change it, and the footer on every utility invoice: your other payment methods, a phone number for account enquiries and complaints, your energy ombudsman's details. The tenant pays from the invoice through your connected payment provider, into your own account. One thing to know if you collect rent by Direct Debit: it collects rent only. Utility invoices are paid from the invoice.

And for the tenant who wants the whole history, or the one who is leaving, the lease page has a statement: every reading on the site's meters with the usage between each pair, every charge raised, what has been paid and what has not.

The mistake you find after it's sent

Before a bill is issued, fixing it takes a moment. Enter the right figure for the same date, it replaces the first, and the bill recalculates.

After it is issued, the readings behind it are locked, on purpose. Nobody can quietly change a number underneath an invoice a tenant has already received. To correct it, void the invoice from the lease page. The readings unlock, the bill goes back to its row and follows the corrected figures, and the voided invoice stays on the lease as the record of what was first billed.

It does not have to be you walking the meters

Utilities has its own permission, in three levels. View opens the page, the reading sheet and lease statements. Enter readings is the one for the groundskeeper who does the walk: they can record readings, while rates and issuing bills stay with you. Manage does the lot. It sits in the same permission groups as the rest of your team's access.

And if your meters report on their own, the walk can go altogether. A smart-meter system can post readings through the REST API, and every reading exports as a CSV with its site, date and source.

Switching over part-way through the year

You do not need to wait for a clean start. Set the date your billing begins to the day after your last bill from the old system. Readings from before that date are kept as history and open the first bill, so nothing gets billed twice across the changeover.

Setup itself is short: which utilities you bill, your rates, which areas have their own meters, and your invoice details. The last step is the utility billing terms. Your organisation is the seller of the utilities it bills, and is responsible for its rates, its invoices and the rules that apply to it. The account owner accepts them, and who accepted and when is kept on record. Which comes back to the note at the top: check what your state allows before you set a rate.

Common questions

Is metered utilities for bookings or leases?

Leases. Bills are raised against the lease of the tenant who holds a metered site. Casual bookings are not metered.

Which utilities can I bill?

Electricity, read in kWh, and water, read in kL. Each has its own rate, supply charge, GST treatment and sequence of readings.

How often do I have to read the meters?

Whenever suits: quarterly, monthly or any date. Each bill picks up where the last one stopped, so nothing is billed twice.

What happens when a tenant moves out part-way through a bill?

Take a reading on their last day and their final bill is ready to issue at once. That reading also opens the next tenant's bill, so each pays for what they used, and the supply charge for their own days.

Can tenants pay a utility invoice by Direct Debit?

No. Direct Debit collects rent only. A utility invoice is emailed to the tenant, who pays it from the invoice.

What if I mistype a reading?

Before the bill is issued, enter the right figure for the same date and the bill recalculates. After it is issued, void the invoice from the lease page: the readings unlock, the bill returns to the Utilities page, and the voided invoice stays on the lease as the record of what was first billed.

Can a smart-meter system post readings?

Yes. Readings can be posted through the REST API with a token that has the Utilities (Write) scope.

Does metered utilities cost extra?

It is on every account, and issuing a utility invoice does not add to your platform fee. Current rates are on the pricing page.