Water meter submeter billing software?

Other than custom writing a program in Excel or other, does anyone have any software suggestions?

It wouldn’t be that hard to write it myself, but I’d rather not reinvent the wheel here. How do you figure your bills for water submetering?

We finally decided to do it ourselves and had a VA in the Philippines put a program together. IF it all works as planned, we will input the lot number, meter read, and month, and out will pop a completed bill. VAs are pretty cheap.

For the actual calculation, excel sheets. The reason being, there is a lot of variation in terms of the actual computation method so one size may not fit all. There may be something if its a straight forward split , but if you have flat fees to a certain amount, surcharge per unit etc, that is where it gets a bit more complex ( which may not be the case)

Doesn’t rent manager or one of the other programs have water meter billing?

Yes, I use and it’s been pretty solid.

Could you be more specific about which software you’re using? Also, if it’s not too far off tnread topic, is there someone here who is familiar enough with Florida chapter 723 to help me get started with sub-metering? The meters are almost installed, but I don’t quite understand the law about reducing the rent, and then adding in water costs, which of course fluctuate.

Lopo, it’s very complicated. It depends on how many POH you have, if any, among other things. If you own most of the homes, you are NOT a MHP and fall under different rules. Hopefully you have everyone on a month to month lease, that will make things much easier.

I strongly recommend you do the following: Join the FMHA, it’s not that much and well worth it. After joining, call and ask them, they’ll refer you to their attorney. He’s very good and will explain it in excruciating detail.

Make sure you have time, and a notepad ready. He likes to quote a TON of code and you will need to write down everything he tells you as you will forget most of it later.

1 Like

Thanks, 2 questions. 1. what is the learning curve? 2. how pricey is it?

Thank you.

Thanks so much. We don’t own any of the homes, and everyone is on month-to-month. The DPBR said they couldn’t help me, and my local atty, whose assistant has handled a couple of evictions for me, doesn’t really know. I will join the FMHA and find a new atty asap.

Being month to month helps a ton, but he’ll fill you in. He is a wealth of info, being a member entitles you to “some” of his time for free, not sure what the limits are.

Don’t bother with other attorneys, he specializes in this.

NEVER ask DPBR anything, they are the most worthless group of bureaucrats since the beginning of governments. They exist to take your money, period!

I wrote them once to ask them that if I took a sample of something to have it tested for asbestos for a client, would that violate asbestos license laws. They said they don’t issue opinions on such matters. BUT - if that’s true, then how do they issue fines or revoke licenses for rules violations??? Both of those statements cannot be true.

RentManager. $75/month regardless of numbers of units or lots. Each additional unique login is another $75 I believe. Support is great whenever you have to give them a call.

Re: learning curve, I think it’s pretty intuitive and didn’t take me all that much time to get up to speed. My manager is not incredibly tech savvy and has gotten acclimated faster than I would have imagined.

We just completed out first billing using a program set up by a VA in the Philippines. Got a couple of little bugs to work out and we will have those fixed by next month. The program is a mix of Word and Excel and it even prints the envelopes. On the bill, residents see their names, lot number, month/year, dates of the current and previous meter read, usage in gallons, lot rent or RTO payment, water, sewer, garbage, any special charges, a total, and space for a monthly message to everyone. This meets all legal requirements for billing in OH per the attorney for the State mh association. The total cost to set it up was about US $200 and this is far less than what billing companies wanted to charge me to set up an account. Billing companies wanted to charge me $5 per month to do this(in addition to the start up fee), so I pay the manager $4.50 per lot and then I pay for the stamps and envelopes. What I really like is that I can so easily check the bills before the manager gets them and make any necessary adjustments for things like late fees, etc., without having to go through an account rep in a different time zone.

If you want to contact the VA, just send me an e-mail and I will give you her e-mail.

1 Like

Thanks Rolf, message sent

Rolf, I don’t know how to send you an email, do I? I’d very much like to contact your VA to do the same thing.

Hi I was wondering if you would share your VA email with me?
Thanks Dan

Well not much luck yet. She’s made a few appointments to call my manager and help her set it up, but she’s missed every call appointment.

But since we’ve paid her she’s no longer responding to our emails.

Very disappointed. Too bad, she had the makings of a decent business.

Well I emailed her this time and made it clear that we have to get this done. She promised that it’d get done this week. I’ll update later.

Coach 62,

Are you talking about Sheryl Pedroso in the Philippines?

Rolf

Rolf, I just want to comment here that Sheryl has been super and responsive with me in designing my billing spreadsheet! (Because of the 13 hour time difference, I don’t try to use the phone.)

Yes, but she has promised to get it taken care of this week. We’ll see if she follows through. There were apparently some issues getting the spreadsheet to merge to the billing portion.