City of Lubbock Utilities (COLU) – Water Utilities

Provider briefing

How this utility’s billing works

City of Lubbock Utilities (COLU) – Water Utilities operates as a municipal department serving Lubbock municipal water and wastewater service area. 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 Increasing block residential tiers with a daily meter-size service charge. Under the FY2026 schedule effective October 1, 2025, single-family, multifamily, and duplex customers with a Utility Users Tax exemption receive the first six 1,000-gallon billing units at $0.000, the next seven units at $6.652 per unit, and units over 13 at $9.706. Customers without that exemption pay $3.474 per unit for the first six, $6.652 for the next seven, and $9.706 above 13. A 5/8- or 3/4-inch potable service has a $0.993 daily service charge; larger meters have higher daily charges. The rate letter also publishes separate commercial, irrigation, reclaimed-water, fireline, and unmetered schedules.. Bills are generated monthly. colu provides monthly consolidated billing for city water, wastewater, stormwater, and solid waste, and the payment portal provides monthly bill and consumption history., and a typical residential cost reference is Using a 30-day month, a 5,000-gallon single-family account is roughly $42 water-and-sewer subtotal when the household receives the first-six-unit water exemption, or about $59 before taxes and other city charges without that exemption; a 7,000-gallon account is roughly $49 exempt or $70 non-exempt. These estimates use the FY2026 5/8- or 3/4-inch daily service charges, the water tiers, and the $0.475-per-100-cubic-foot sewer volume rate, and exclude Lubbock's separately billed stormwater, solid waste, utility taxes, and any payment fees. Actual statements vary with billing days and the account's wastewater averaging rules.. 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

Residential wastewater is billed from metered water usage and is subject to a household-based consumption calculation that uses the customer's non-irrigation meter history; official City ordinance materials describe a household-based consumption value updated for billing and a default seven-thousand-gallon volume where sufficient history is unavailable. The FY2026 sewer schedule charges a $0.300 daily service charge for a 5/8- or 3/4-inch service plus $0.475 per 100 cubic feet of sewer volume. Commercial and other account classes can be calculated differently. Customers should compare the sewer quantity and household average printed on the monthly consolidated bill because the sewer component is not a separate residential flow meter.

Meter and infrastructure notes

COLU performs consolidated monthly meter reading and billing for city water and wastewater. Customers can view bill and historical consumption data through the KUBRA portal and the City has published materials describing water consumption rounded into 1,000-gallon billing units. The reviewed current pages do not identify one universal AMI/AMR vendor, transmission interval, or exact route-reading schedule; the verified customer-facing cadence is a monthly bill with portal history, while emergency dispatch and water-meter maintenance are handled by City Water Utilities.