Hyd water board earns Rs 774 cr revenues in FY14

Total collection came against a demand billing for Rs 734.32 crore, HMWS&SB stated in a release

The Hyderabad Metro Water Supply and Sewerage Board (HMWS&SB) posted a record Rs 773.73 crore revenue in the 2013-14 financial year, mainly on the back of better recovery management and strong enforcement methods. The revenue figure was up 19 per cent, as against Rs 645 crore in the 2012-13 fiscal.

Total collection came against a demand billing for Rs 734.32 crore, HMWS&SB stated in a release.

“Around Rs 40 crore was due to the reduction in unaccounted-for water and other measures including strong enforcement against defaultors, arrears, better billing standards and performance-based incentives for the field-level staff,” said Shyamala Rao, managing director of HMWS&SB.

The board achieved its highest monthly revenues of Rs 160 crore in March. “This is significant as the average monthly bill collections were stagnant at Rs 51 crore 18 months ago,” said Rao.

The paid consumers per month rose from 384,499 a year ago to 450,690 this year. Deployment of electronic point-of-sale (PoS) machines and SMS-based bill alert helped the board put up a strong performance, he said.

According to the board, the percentage of unaccounted-for water in the system has improved to 38 per cent from 47 per cent a year ago. It had received 6,000 applications under the voluntary disclosure scheme (VDS) for illegal water connections in the city.

“These would generate around Rs 18 lakh revenues to the board each month,” said Rao. He estimated an average Rs 300 from each consumer.

Besides this, 15,000 consumers had come forward to clear the pending bill amounts, mostly domestic consumers, he added.  The scheme allowed consumers to waive off the interest accumulated on dues.