I've been auditing electric accounts for a couple years with no major data collection issues. Just started adding water and sewer to my service offering and the data collection is significantly harder. Augusta Utilities here in Georgia doesn't have an online portal, doesn't accept email submissions, and took 5 weeks to respond to a mailed LOA. Electric utilities seem much more set up for third-party data requests. Is water always this difficult?
Water utility data is harder to get than electric — anyone else notice this?
Water utilities are almost always harder. Most are municipal departments with smaller staffs and less sophisticated billing systems than the IOUs. Oklahoma City water took me 6 weeks to get data from. They physically had to pull paper records from a filing room. The good news is that water bills are usually simpler than electric so you need less data to do the audit — often just 12-24 months of bills showing consumption tiers and sewer charges. The bad news is getting even that basic data can be a slog.
Baton Rouge Water Company was the same for me — slow and paper-based. But I've found that showing up in person at the utility office with a signed LOA gets results much faster than mailing or faxing for municipal water departments. Small staffs mean your paper request sits in a pile. Walking in and asking the billing clerk to pull records while you wait can get you data the same day that would take weeks by mail.
Water utilities are generally less automated and less familiar with third-party requests than electric IOUs. Budget extra time for water data collection — I usually estimate twice as long as electric. Marie's suggestion about in-person visits is practical for local accounts. For out-of-state water accounts, be persistent with follow-up calls. The squeaky wheel approach works better with small municipal water departments than with large IOUs where everything is procedural.