Kibkom North Cyprus Forum

On our site at Esentepe 88 properties are all being told we have to have prepayment water meters installed at a cost of 350TL each!!! Apparently we then have to top up a prepayment card in the village council as and when.

As most of us pay our bills on time I wonder why this is being forced upon us! In the UK prepayment meters are only installed upon request or to people who don't pay their bills!!

Does anyone in the Esentepe area know if this is a policy now for all properties in the Esentepe area?

Yes - we got a notice posted in our gate before Christmas. A friend was informed by Belediye and told that non payers will be targetted first. Apparently, you will have to pay any outstanding rates/taxes before being allowed to top up - so it will be a way for the council to recoup a lot of unpaid revenue. Not sure when it is all going to be implemented but if the are really going after non payers it could be some time before they get to us.

If it gets everyone to pay their dues in the long run that is a good thing and 50tl on a water meter should last a while so pre-paying should not be all that painful surely?

I believe that it's been implemented in other municipalities already.

Jonnie wrote:If it gets everyone to pay their dues in the long run that is a good thing and 50tl on a water meter should last a while so pre-paying should not be all that painful surely?

Fair point Jonnie that's true I suppose.

Thanks for all the replies at least this confirms it.

Cheers

Hopefully it would prevent enormous bills presented to houses where no one lives all year round and no water is used much this has happened to my friend three times 700tl last time and she could prove the house was unoccupied but she had to pay it.

We have had prepayment water meters fitted in Bellapais for years and I think the cost back then was more than 350tl.

I assume this can only be the case if your water is directly piped-in by the Belediye, which is not always the case in Esentepe.
Be interesting to know how much per ton they are charging, and how it compares to complexes who have their water tankered-in.

Could be a good reason to reject the Belediyes offer of connection.

Thoughts appreciated.

Currently 2TL per tonne plus 3TL standing charge plus KDV @ 5%. So 10 tonnes a month = 24.15TL = 290TL a year, 10 tonnes delivered is about 100TL(?) = 1200 TL a year. Add on 350TL for new meter to first cost 290 + 350 = 640 TL, still cheaper than delivered water. Even if you only average 5 tonnes a month, it works out at 514TL a year compared with 600TL delivered. Just realised that the standing charge is for 2 months so it costs even less...

Of course on a complex you probably pay less than 10TL a tonne but it doesn't take long to absorb the cost.

Nice to have this decided for us and then have to pay about £100 for the privilege. We were doing fine without one as we only visit twice a year.
Hope they can guarantee the supply if we are being expected to pay up front.

WotNoDeeds wrote:We have had prepayment water meters fitted in Bellapais for years and I think the cost back then was more than 350tl.

it varied between 350tl to 550tl, I purchased 6 for customers over a period of 3 years but what has annoyed me now you still have a monthly charge, I look after a property who still has 9 units credit on it and village rates have been paid but as I have not had water there is 160tl owing. I accept they have to pay for cleaning etc but I don't want the 10 units of water!
I now every 3 months have the minimum water and place on the meter, 1 house now has 210 units on their meter!

I'm not sure if its 10 tonnes a month or every 2 months we currently get free from Esentepe Belediye but I wonder, when these meters are fitted does the free tonnage stop altogether?

Hi Guru

Very interested in your statement that you get water for free - how does that work? We are billed for every tonne plus a standing charge. A neighbour made a similar statement to my husband but I see bills on our small site for a number of properties and we all get billed in the same way.

come_on_aylin wrote:Hi Guru

Very interested in your statement that you get water for free - how does that work? We are billed for every tonne plus a standing charge. A neighbour made a similar statement to my husband but I see bills on our small site for a number of properties and we all get billed in the same way.

Hi Aylin, as far as I know we get 10 tons (every 2 months I think) free and billed for the rest. However, I have not really studied our bill in detail as we don't live there, just holidays.

I doubt that anyone gets free water here via mains. As I said, a neighbour was under the same impression.

In Ozankoy there is a standing charge of 21.72TL per month which includes 5 tons of water ..
21.72TL even when nothing is used ..
Over 5 tons used & the bill rises fast ..

When I hear what other areas charge I think we do pretty well in Esentepe.

Just out of interest, does anyone know weather it is the whole of the Esentepe area that is getting payment meters or just the sites that are being targeted

come_on_aylin wrote:I doubt that anyone gets free water here via mains. As I said, a neighbour was under the same impression.

Could possibly be the 'free' 10 tons are supplied from within the standing charge.

i understand the water meters will be fitted to every property in the Esentepe area and its a mandatory requirement.

In simple terms if you don't purchase a card and pay for a new meter-no water.

Art wrote:...i understand ... its a mandatory requirement...

Not that I live in the Esentepe area, although I have friends that do...

When you say 'mandatory requirement' - do you mean an actual 'LEGAL' requirement, empowered by an act of Parliament? - or is it perhaps just Esentepe Belediyesi arbitrarily imposing a 'rule' without the necessary authority?

I will quite understand if you don't know the answer to this, and are simply passing on 'information received' in good faith, it's just that sometimes it is easy to accept things without questioning them, only to find out later that they had no actual foundation in law...

Keith does it need to be? They provide the liquid that comes through the pipe so I guess they can impose what they like as far as metering is concerned... I think we will just have to 'suck it up!'

Bellapais was one of the first areas where certain households were told they had to have a water meter, the bottom line is you have no choice so you just have to get on with it.

Also they were over 550TL back in 2007/8 so if you are being charged 350TL you are lucky.

At that time we were told that every household in the TRNC will eventually have to use these and they are already in many areas outside of Girne.

They really are very simple to use the only difference is you are paying for your water upfront instead of in arrears in all honesty we supported this initiative if only to stop people racking up huge bills then not paying and leaving the rest of us who pay promptly being penalised with higher charges to cover the non payers of the system.

I wonder when the electric will start this, that will put pressure on all the big hotels and belediyes to get their bills paid!!

I would hate to see the size of Cratos Hotel's bill for all those lights (if they ever pay it!!)

Owl Lady wrote: I would hate to see the size of Cratos Hotel's bill for all those lights (if they ever pay it!!)

I'd love to see the manager, or whoever, going along to Kibtek with a sackful of TL to load up an electric pre-payment card!

Local beledesi rub hands with glee on how to take advantage of sites such as yours Guru.
88x proposed costs is hell of a lot of money.
Really annoys me the continual rip off by these local councils, especially taking advantage of swallows.

Well guru, this is an eye opener, or may I say a wallet opener...
I did a bit of maths in the case of 88 properties, and here it is in writing for the ones praise advance payment & monthly

88 X 350 = 30,800 TL

monthly standing charges at 21.75Tl (assuming this is the actual rate & tax incl.)
88 X 21.75 = 1,914 TL per month
1914 X 12m = 22,968 TL per year

This is a very good revenue for Esentepe Council.....

In reality as we all know and sad to say, expats are targeted to subsidise the locals and make up for Council loss revenue. It is far easier for the Esentepe City Council to turn blind eye on local debts, because it knows most of them can not afford advance prepayment and repayment for water.

Even when it comes to collection & disposal of foul waste water, the facility is only available to the locals at a low price. Expats get told to contact private companies and pay high price "money that should go into the council coffers" is diverted to private company.

sad but true.
fatsam

I don't understand the comments on this being based at expats. We were informed that every Belediye will ultimately being having these, it is just a slow process of getting them distributed.

Many area's of Lefkosa have these already and have had so for the last 4 or 5 years - how many expats live there?

fattsam
Your post is spot on could not agree more.

The problem for Esentepe Belediye is that a lot of the complexes are not connected to the mains water and are supplied by the local tankers, with the water used for the swimming pools and domestic use. To enable them to be able to fit their pre-payment metres they are going to have to instal their pipe network to the site in question.
Without their title deeds, contractual owners of the properties on the complex will have to ask the Belediye to negotiate with the developer regarding permissions to dig up private areas.
Who is going to pay for this costly work ?
Certainly not the developer of the site.
Certainly not the contractual owners.
Certainly not the Belediye.
So if you do not have mains water now, I cant see you having it any time soon, which is good news for those not living on-site.

We are on mains water but I'd guess complexes without could not be made to have them fitted... surely!