How paying your water bill can help with your groceries
A Sale family has become the latest Gippsland Water customer to receive a thank you simply for paying its water bill with Direct Debit.
The Stefanetti family have been using direct debit to pay their household water bill for six years.
“It’s just the convenience really,” said Kim Stefanetti. “The small amount of money comes out every couple of weeks and takes care of the bill every quarter” Kim continued.
Gippsland Water has been encouraging customers to switch to using Direct Debit over recent months by offering a prize of a $250 shopping voucher to one Direct Debit customer every month.
“We appreciate that a water bill every four months can come as a shock to some customers, so using Direct Debit is a great way for customers to stay in control of their finances and avoid that ‘bill shock’,” said Gippsland Water’s General Manager of Customer Services and Communications Paul Clark.
“This is the first time we’ve been able to reward a customer in the Sale area under this scheme. We’ve had winners in all the other major towns as well as some of the smaller towns, so it’s great to see a winner from the Wellington Shire,” added Paul.
“The initiative to reward those customers who pay by Direct Debit has helped spread the word among customers and encourage a large number to sign up,” added Mr Clark.
Direct Debit not only helps customers stay in control of their bill, it also helps Gippsland Water keep its costs down. “Direct Debit is a much cheaper way for Gippsland Water to receive payment, so it actually helps us put downward pressure on customers water bills,” said Mr Clark.
“By putting an incentive in place for customers to choose Direct Debit, much like we did with people to use electronic billing, it reduces our costs and allows us to keep charges to customers as low as possible.”
Gippsland Water has almost 4,000 customers using e-billing since it was introduced in June 2014.
An incentive in the form of an ipad mini was on offer to customers who signed up to receive their bill via email. This was also won by a Sale family who received the ipad in recent weeks.
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