TIRANA, Sept. 24- As Tirana has recently been suffering from a water supply shortage, the Tirana Water and Sewerage Company (UKT) has notified its customers in a letter that it has begun the procedure of verifying and testing the water consumption meters they own.
According to the notification, periodic water gauge verification will be subject to all water meters that have met the criteria of their placement date, which as defined in Order 195 from March 2009 about the initial and subsequent verification of legally controlled metering instruments, is 60 months or 5 years. In case the water gauge will need to be changed, then the customer is liable for the costs of supply and installation of the water meter according to the invoice provided by the Operator (value not disclosed).
The water utility informs the customers that they should be present during this procedure to make this process as transparent as possible with representatives of UKT and the entity authorized by the General Directorate of Metrology for water meter monitoring. At the end of the verification/testing, the water meter will be equipped with a verification stamp, which will certify the fulfillment of legal and technical specifications for the device.
Customers will be notified by the relevant Unit (UKT sh.a. structure) covering the area where the facility is located and the entity conducting the verification as to the date and time of carrying out this process. The verification act may be carried out in the premises to which the water supply contract is concluded or in the laboratories of the licensed entity. They must be notified one month in advance of replacing the water meter at the end of its service life, according to the water meter list compiled by the Operator itself. The General Directorate of Metrology has authorized private legal entities to carry out the activity of verifying water consumption measuring apparatus.
According to the announcement, the water utility informs that if after measuring the device it results that the device owned is out of technical-legal conditions for use, then the citizen should take measures within 30 days from the notification date of Metering Verification Act to provide a new gauge with accessories, verified and/or audited by legal entities authorized by the General Directorate of Metrology and request its placement by UKT.
In case one does not take any measures to replace the water consumption meter with a new one within the technical conditions, then UKT is obliged to replace the gauge itself provided for payment of the metering supply value to be applied to the next invoice, as specified in the type contract.
