New York City Department of Environmental Protection – Bureau of Customer Services / NYC Water Board

Provider briefing

How this utility’s billing works

New York City Department of Environmental Protection – Bureau of Customer Services / NYC Water Board operates as a municipal department serving New York City’s five boroughs (Bronx, Kings/Brooklyn, New York/Manhattan, Queens, and Richmond/Staten Island), with the Catskill-Delaware supply system also serving connected upstate facilities. Customers should use the provider’s current account-specific bill and official customer-service instructions as the final authority for deadlines, balances, and service requests.

The published water-rate framework is described as Metered consumption priced in hundred-cubic-foot (HCF) units, where 1 HCF equals 748 gallons, with sewer billed as a percentage of the water charge; a separate flat per-dwelling-unit Multi-Family Conservation Program exists for eligible larger buildings. The NYC Water Board’s current rate table lists FY2027 (July 1, 2026–June 30, 2027) water at $5.35 per 100 cubic feet, sewer at 159% of water ($8.51), and combined water/sewer at $13.86 per HCF. The DEP summary page currently displays $13.50 for combined charges, so the final Water Board rate table is retained as the authoritative current schedule in this record.. Bills are generated quarterly for most customers with small properties and metered usage. dep’s faq says water meters are read once every four hours by automated meter reading devices, while bills are generated once every three months for most customers. larger residential buildings may participate in the multi-family conservation program, which uses a flat per-unit annual charge rather than ordinary quarterly metered billing., and a typical residential cost reference is Approximately $93–$130 per month for water and sewer for a metered single-family property using 5,000–7,000 gallons in a month, calculated at the FY2027 combined rate of $13.86 per 748 gallons and excluding any separate service-line protection, penalties, or other account charges. DEP’s FY2026 rate proposal described a typical single-family annual bill based on 70,000 gallons; actual charges depend on HCF rounding, the bill period, estimated versus actual reads, and property classification.. These descriptions are useful planning benchmarks; actual charges can change with meter size, usage, sewer averaging, local taxes, drought stages, or account-specific fees.

Wastewater and sewer calculation

For ordinary metered accounts, DEP measures water consumption between the prior and current meter readings, converts cubic feet into 100-cubic-foot units, and applies the Water Board’s sewer rate of 159% of the water rate. At the current FY2027 schedule, $5.35 water plus $8.51 sewer equals $13.86 combined per HCF. There is no standard winter-average calculation for the ordinary metered account described by DEP; eligible larger residential properties may instead use the Multi-Family Conservation Program’s flat per-unit annual charge.

Meter and infrastructure notes

NYC uses Automated Meter Reading (AMR) devices attached to water meters; the devices transmit readings to DEP’s computerized billing system up to four times per day, while the billing FAQ describes reads once every four hours. Most small properties are billed quarterly from metered HCF consumption, and an estimated bill may be generated from historical usage when a signal is unavailable. DEP is upgrading more than 600,000 AMR devices citywide to improve reliability and real-time consumption information; current Water Board materials state that hundreds of thousands have been replaced and another large deployment is underway. Customers can view daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly usage through My DEP Account and submit a meter reading by calling 718-595-7000 up to seven calendar days before the next bill date when eligible.