How much you'll be paying under Wellington's new water regime

There has been shock and confusion for some Wellington residents, as households received separate water bills totalling hundreds of dollars for the quarter.Tiaki Wai, which took over from 1 July, sent the first quarterly bill to Wellington region residents yesterday - with a due date of payment of 1 September 2026.RNZ has seen bills ranging between $400 and $900 due in just over a month. Property owners can pay by direct debit, online or phone banking, or over the counter at NZ Post stores offering the service.New water entity Tiaki Wai has said Wellingtonians will face steep charges for water over the coming decade as it tries to fix old, failing infrastructure and decades of under-investment.The average Wellington resident was previously paying about $2100 in water services as part of their rates bill. Water bills on average will increase by 13.3 percent in this financial year.That has led to confusion over whether new council rates will be the same amount, and whether the increased cost for water comes on top of that.Wellington Mayor Andrew Little told Nine to Noon that it was not the case that people's total water and rates bills were soaring by 40 or 50 percent.Wellington Mayor Andrew Little.RNZ / Mark PapaliiThe water component - which had previously been incorporated in the council rates bill - will be taken out of the next overall rates bill, which made up about 20 percent of council rates' bills. Council rates were increasing by 5.9 percent."It is a little bit confusing," Little said. "Water has come out [of the rates bill], it's been increased, rates have been increased by an average of 5.9 percent, that will be your total picture."People should receive their Wellington city rates bills by email next week; posted copies will come the week after that.In a social media post on Wednesday, Deputy Mayor Ben McNulty said combined increases from water and rates bills would come to about 9 percent for the average Wellingtonian.People can check the amount of their new council rates on the council site here and the amount of their water bills here.But residents have raised concerns about affordability."Hell of a shock when I opened that email - I'm a widow, living on my own in the family home and this is certainly not affordable for people on a benefit," one person posted on social media.Little said there had been "a fair effort" in communicating the change - with regular messages from both the council and Tiaki Wai about different components."So preparing people for the idea there will be separate bills I think has been, I think a reasonable effort has been made to do that."Another person said: "I just love that our whanau are going to be paying $3000 per year for water, yet the leak at the end of the driveway isn't getting fixed any time soon."A leak in the Wellington CBD.RNZ / Angus DreaverAsked about the affordability of the new water entity, Little said there had "been a wake-up call to water infrastructure and the quality of water supply".But he said there was a "tension" in pricing arrangements between councils and Tiaki Wai, in that councils now had little control over the entity, which had been set up as a new company with the five Wellington councils only minority shareholders.The five councils had some say in their membership on the partners committee."I have to say it's not rigorous control. There's no veto right that the partners committee has in terms of decisions Tiaki Wai makes. It is a point of influence, but that's as far as it goes."I think we do need to do, we need to have more. I think the Commerce Commission needs to be more actively involved. And I think the reality is that partners committee is going to just have to be sort of belligerent and courageous and assert the rights and interests of residents and ratepayers. That's the only way it's going to work."There was concern in how the water bills were being calculated. At the moment, bills are based on property valuation - Tiaki Wai has said this is the way charges have been done before, and will change in the future as the organisation looks to water metering.