Think of Ireland, the Emerald Isle, and maybe you think of Guinness, good conversation (Craic), good music ... and rain. Ireland is famous for its precipitation; indeed, its abundance largely accounts for the lush green of the Irish landscape. Hence the assumption among much of the population that water supply should be no problem in this well-provided land. Not so.
Acronyms/
Abbreviations |
| IS: |
Information system |
| IT: |
Information technology |
| NOD: |
Nicholas O'Dwyer |
Both the economic growth that has led to the country becoming known as the "Celtic Tiger" and its growing population of some four million are adding to the strain placed on its water and sewerage networks. The huge requirement for renewal and expansion of Ireland's water and wastewater infrastructure demands major investment that can be raised realistically only through charges to water customers.
The Legal Requirement
Water charges for domestic (residential) customers were abolished in 1997, with the Irish government pledging to cover the cost of service provision. Non-domestic (commercial and industrial) customers are required to pay, however, under the government's 1998 Water Pricing Policy Framework. This legislation mandated that by 2006 all county and city councils that provided water and sewerage services charge their non-domestic customers on the basis of water and waste water service usage. In most cases, this involves the installation of water meters and automated meter reading together with the supporting interfaces to the councils' billing, revenue collection and customer service systems.
Progress in complying with the legal requirement has been slow:
Figure 1: Map of Ireland showing locations of PB/Nicholas O’Dwyer Ltd water metering projects
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Figure 2: Existing provision of water-metering service. The two-way arrows indicate interfaces with other council
functions and third parties.
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Figure 3: Future integrated provision of water metering service.
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Figure 4: Typical (simplified) process flow model.
Note:
CiS: Complete Information
System, which is a
geographical asset
database.
DIRS: Data and Information
Repository System
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Figure 5: Typical data flows for water metering service.
Note: MCC – Mayo County Council
NDM – Non-domestic
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- In September 2003 only about 37.5 percent of non-domestic customers were metered, implying that installation of some 150,000 water meters was needed nationally together with the upgrade of many thousands more that did not satisfy requirements for accuracy and reliability.
- According to the 2004 National Water Survey, an average of 47 percent of all water in supply schemes was categorised as "unaccounted for water loss"1 (non-revenue water), reflecting incomplete and inadequate metering, as well as many years of under investment by the government.
- As of mid 2005, collection of water charges was patchy.
Against this background, the Department of Environment,
Heritage and Local Government encouraged local authorities to formulate programmes to satisfy the 2006 deadline. A pilot project initiated in County Sligo provided information for other councils regarding progress and issues encountered.
Several councils decided to engage consulting engineers to advise them and to engineer and manage their water metering projects. PB, in conjunction with Irish consulting engineers Nicholas O'Dwyer Ltd (NOD), secured commissions with Irish county councils in Wicklow, Donegal, Clare and Mayo (Figure 1). Combined, these accounted for 23 percent of Ireland's land area and a population of some half million.
The Scope of the Task
Our studies indicated that the revenue from non-domestic water customers in each county should increase typically four-fold to €5,000,000 per annum. All four councils wanted to establish comprehensive metering service that would secure their revenue streams in the long term and enable them to establish sustainable water charges for reinvestment. Previous difficulties with achieving revenue collection targets were recognised, as was the political sensitivity of increasing and in some cases introducing charges to large numbers of local businesses. Hence stakeholder consultation was given very high priority.
PB and NOD formulated a model to illustrate the processes that are involved in collection of water revenue (Figure 2). Extensive interviews during the requirements capture phase with each client confirmed that in each case the existing service was fragmented-a fact that contributed to the low revenue collection rates and service performance currently achieved.
Analysis of the user requirements confirmed the need for an integrated approach to service provision, as represented by Figure 3. This new model has data and information systems at the centre of the process. Each of the six primary service elements provide data to a central store of information as well as use information from it in the course of their activities. This central store concept, which became known as the Data Interface Repository System (DIRS), was found to be applicable to all four local authorities with only detail variations for each.
It also became apparent that there are considerable synergies between the metering service and other council functions that can be exploited by efficient integration of information. These included:
- Use of water consumption data for network management and leakage detection
- Consolidation of customer records for better management of planning applications and new water connections.
Service Procurement
PB and NOD conducted a thorough option development and risk analysis exercise to identify a number of feasible procurement models that would deliver the required metering service within the required parameters of performance, cost and quality. These were discussed extensively with key stakeholders-internal (council staff and departments) and external (customer groups and external agencies). The chosen model varied in each case due to differing organisational factors, including resources and funding issues. In each case, however:
- A number of service elements were chosen to be outsourced, typically including the labour-intensive meter installation and maintenance, and meter reading activities.
- Each of the four councils retained responsibility for billing and revenue collection, despite (or perhaps because of) the experience of providing a fully outsourced solution in the Sligo pilot project.
Retaining billing and collection in-house was seen as advantageous to councils seeking to provide a "one-stop-shop" for customers to access council services, which include planning, environmental and roads functions. It also maximizes benefit from the investment in the Agresso billing systems that have been adopted as the preferred standard by most Irish local authorities.
PB and NOD helped the four authorities to establish short-lists of preferred suppliers for the outsourced services with the intention of contract award during the first quarter of 2006. The contracts were structured to ensure that the underground assets (meters, meter boxes and service connections) are supplied and installed to a high standard conducive to the possible takeover of the assets by the council at the end of the maintain/operate period (nominally ten years).
Incentives and penalties are provided to promote timely and accurate provision of meter readings and other customer data. This is backed up by a comprehensive performance management system developed by NOD and PB in consultation with council stakeholders.
The provision of automated meter reading (AMR) systems was viewed as an economic decision for the contractor, given rapid developments in available technology and associated capital and operating costs. It was noted that experience of with these systems in Ireland has not been entirely positive, as demonstrated through the various pilot projects conducted to date.
Business Process Development
The management of billing, revenue collection and customer service for maybe 9,000 additional customers by each council represents a large increase in the scale and scope of their activity. PB assisted with the mapping and definition of the various business processes affected. Figure 4 shows typical output from one of the business process workshops we conducted.
Almost always, participants commented that their understanding of their in-house processes was enhanced by these analyses. The resulting Change Management Plans then enabled them to identify the necessary resources and funding.
Information Systems
Underpinning the new water metering service in each case are information systems consisting of three primary elements:
- The contractor's meter reading and customer records system
- The council's billing and financial system (Agresso)
- A Data Interface Repository System (DIRS).
The architectural model in each case will vary, depending on the council's own corporate data systems architecture and in-house IS/IT capabilities. Figure 5 summarises the typical data flows involved.
PB is providing expertise to help the councils prepare for the first full round of water billing based on real consumption by the end of 2006. The four projects described have had a considerable influence on the councils' provision of services. Their scope is notable in terms of the range of activities covered, from consultation with stakeholders (trades unions, commercial interest groups etc.) through to management of disruption during meter installations and from water charging policy to business process redesign.
At the time of writing, meters are being installed in three of the four counties, and first rounds of consumption-based billing are being prepared. The widespread customer acceptance of water charging is testimony to the thoroughness of the planning and implementation of these complex projects.
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