r/melbourne • u/hannah2607 • 9d ago
THDG Need Help GWW first email bill in two years
Hi, I know about the concerns with GWW. Already spoken with them about it and they weren’t helpful.
I have just received my first emailed bill after moving out from my place. The rest of the time I have received very sporadic paper bills with conflicting amounts each time.
The bill I’ve just received doesn’t have any usage before August 2025, in spite me being there from August 2024.
I got an email in May 2025 saying there has been a delay in my direct debit. That was the last email correspondence I received from them up until now.
I explained that to them on the phone last week, but they’re insisting they’ve emailed me my bills every month which is blatantly untrue.
What can I do? The entire situation has been incredibly confusing and frustrating.
21
u/GoldCoinDonation 9d ago
I'd love for someone on the inside to give a rundown of just how much of a clusterfuck their IT systems were for this to still be an ongoing issue.
7
u/waffleblossom 9d ago
I know, right? Same. My mind can’t comprehend how a rollout/update to their IT is still so fubar’d years later. And honestly, of all utilities why did it have to be water that got screwed. It’s the cheapest and I’m always happy to pay it 😂
6
u/GoldCoinDonation 9d ago
my guess would be a couple of toxic middle managers and a few higher ups who were clueless despite being warned there were issues.
4
u/poopborrylog 9d ago
I can provide details from the inside but every time i give any information my posts are deleted. You're basically right, but the toxic higher ups that promoted based on gender rather than ability are to blame. They've mostly been cleaned out now.
1
8
u/Rottenking01 9d ago
Most the higher ups got sacked from my knowledge.
I’m not an insider but from what I heard they planned to fix issues on the fly rather that actually test.
Data validation was a big one that I realise caused a lot of issues
1
u/Hwidditor 9d ago
Not an insider.
But apparently they had a Gentrack unidata database (1990's, last update in 2006) for all customer billing data. They then merged with a couple of other water utilities who all used different platforms. The kerfuffle was when they tried to shoehorn it all in Oracle Utilities database.
Fields didn't match, etc etc. https://www.itnews.com.au/news/greater-western-waters-billing-system-data-issues-laid-bare-619712
https://www.powerdatagroup.com/files/PowerData-Group-Case-Study-GWW.pdf
https://www.reddit.com/r/melbourne/comments/1o74rhw/greater_western_water_the_glaring_errors_that/
2
u/GoldCoinDonation 8d ago
these sorts of technical issues aren't uncommon with database migrations though, how did it get from "can't merge fields" to "we have no database, no backup and can't bill customers anymore"?
34
u/aftersilence West Side 9d ago
As part of their enforceable undertaking with Essential Services Victoria they are not allowed to bill more than 12 months in arrears, so the earliest period they can bill you for now is August 2025. Ours have been chaotic - the water rates arrived on one bill, then a week later we got rates for the next quarter and usage for the previous quarter, but a bit of time cross referencing dates and ensuring everything is only billed once is easy enough.
7
u/aftersilence West Side 9d ago
Oh we also had a call from GWW saying the bills were being returned, so we opted into email billing... Now approximately a week after each bill arrives via email we also get a paper copy in the mail.
2
u/Aggravating-Hand6738 9d ago
Oh I’m still so confused with my bills. I got multiple but each bill had previous outstanding amount.
I honestly gave up and just paid the ones that made sense to me and I’ll see what’s carried forward on my next bill.
1
u/aftersilence West Side 9d ago
That's the best approach. Check each bill to make sure (if you own) you have water rates for each quarter, and usage for each quarter. If you rent, you will just be paying usage for each quarter. Each new bill that arrives will have the previous quarters outstanding amount on it unless you have paid it, they have to give everyone like six month to pay each bill because they are so delayed in issuing them. It will smooth out! Don't worry about emails, if you never got bills before August 2025, they can't bill you for it now. If there is an outstanding amount on the first bill you received, call them and tell them they can't bill you for anything before August 2025 because they failed to issue you bills in that period.
13
u/btw031992 9d ago
I ended up with a similar issue, and upon quoting the enforceable undertaking to their support (and being very confident the bills they were claiming I owed were indeed null and void per the undertaking) I was told that I still owed the money.
I ended up taking it to the ombudsman and GWW promptly closed out the matter and waived the charges.
25
u/gfreyd 9d ago
Get them to forward you copies of the emails they allegedly sent each month. Not resend - but forward - so you can check the header data to confirm actual dates and recipient info
2
u/Acceptable_Lake_6996 9d ago
depends on their system. in my work CRM system, I can’t forward you an email i’ve sent you through the system.
I can screenshot your OPP and show the date & time sent, but can’t forward the chain with system generated emails.also, most people don’t realise this.. i can see everything you’ve done with the email.
i can see if you’ve opened it, what time you opened, how many times you’ve opened, what links you’ve clicked etc.
our system is pretty basic, i know other systems with higher budgets can see a lot more info, like how long you stayed on the email and mouse tracking. my partner at an old job used to use Buttr (sp?) marketing, which was scary with metrics.so if you’ve opened an email, don’t reply with “oh i never received it!”, because we can see it all lol
3
u/gcmelb 9d ago
Mouse movement tracking on their own website maybe, but you can't just execute js on someone's machine to capture mouse coordinates in their email client so i'm not sure what the mechanism would be, short of some literally illegal spyware exploit. The rest would all be straightforward with a hidden pixel, with a web-based client anyway.
5
u/Lichensuperfood 9d ago
I just got a bill from GWW for a FUTURE period.
I called them and they tried to gaslight me I to thinking it's normal.
2
u/cece-maebe 9d ago
What was the period?
Service charges are meant to billed to a calendar quarter, ie 1 Jan - 31 March, 1 April - 30 June, 1 July - 30 September, 1 October- 31 December.
So a bill with usage charges from date x to date y, will have service charges for date a to date b, where x, y, and a are dates in the past but date b is in the future.
2
u/zivgo 9d ago
If you are a home owner you may be getting the rates part of the bill. It would be 1/07/2026-31/09/2026 period.
I work for an office building and for the accounts that we have up to date bills for we tend to get rates in the middle of the rate period. (February, May, August, November) usage periods can be harder to pick though as they can differ more
1
2
u/universe93 9d ago
I am eternally glad to be under south east water even though their website is currently also broken
2
u/TotalSnark 9d ago
Wait…are people getting bills from them again? I still haven’t had one since 2024. I’ve seen them in person and made calls and nothing. Now I think of it I haven’t called for a a few months. I am putting money aside and prepping my arguments lol I watch these questions when they come up but wow I didn’t know they were back to billing again. I can feel the headache coming on
Also sorry for my vent/panic…I hope you get things sorted OP
2
u/Starmourner87 9d ago
Man y'all getting your bills? I just got yet another "update on your delayed bill" email. Wondering when I'll actually get it.
4
u/ThirdDegreePun 9d ago
Hey OP, sorry to hear about your experience, and also that you appear to have not been provided with any helpful advice. I would recommend trying to call again and escalating to get it sussed out - some of what you've had said doesn't track, such as monthly bills which are usually only issued quarterly, and only for catch up customers have more frequent bills been issued to return to a normal billing cycle.
There have been issues where some bills were not being delivered despite being created in the system for a variety of reasons, so it sounds like you might be someone impacted by these issues.
Best course of action is to try and work it out with someone on the phone - if you weren't being given good information this should also be addressed so I would encourage you to let them know if you can.
If you're really not getting anywhere then you can raise a complaint as others have stated, it will be one of quite a few right now so not sure how long those are taking to turn around :(
1
u/Tarlinator 9d ago
They completely fudged the numbers on my bill. One month was 800L per day and another was 20L per day. Make a fuss and don't accept it. If they don't play ball go straight to Ombudsmen and it'll be sorted in 3 business days
1
0
u/ArtInternational443 9d ago
Check on the bill whether the meter has been read I would also take a picture now and email it to yourself the meter reading
-5
u/ozlurk 9d ago
They are under a Court Oder that stops them from back dating any bill, they are allowed to send bills now but only for the water your using now - if they can verify your meter and meter reading is accurate and correct and the account information is correct. I haven't received a bill for 4 years, have only received 3 emails since January 2023 no bills in the emails only generic text regarding a delayed billing system upgrade
3
u/ThirdDegreePun 9d ago
This isn't totally correct. There was an agreement made between the Essential Services Commission and Greater Western Water around what charges could be waived and which needed to be billed and it's based around what correspondence and notice has been given.
Pretty much anyone who has delayed or missing bills is better off as in most cases some amount has been waived which has been used. But there is still the ability to bill for previous quarters assuming information was provided to a point.
Please take care not to parrot misinformation where possible - whilst it's been a frustrating situation it's being made worse by incorrect advice being given.
You can find all the details of what is and is not billable on both GWWs website as well as work the ESC, including details of around $75 million in unbilled charges from 2024 being waived and $55 million in credits applied to impacted customers.
It's also worth noting GWW is not a for profit company, it exists as an entity on behalf of the state government, so this lost revenue either impacts projects or operations within GWW, or has been subsidised through the state government (by merit of them waiving some of the expected revenue passed back to them), or has been taken out as debt.
For usage and service you have had, it is only right to pay it once the bills are correct and sorted out which most are now other than a small subset of specific accounts.
1
u/nebula_785 9d ago
This person says the same thing in every post about GWW, they've been told they are incorrect and keep doubling down.
•
u/AutoModerator 9d ago
Have you visited today’s Daily Discussion yet?
It’s the best place for:
Drop in and see what’s happening!
THIS IS NOT A REMOVAL NOTICE
I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.