To check a Texas allocated water bill, compare your lease’s allocation formula, the property’s master utility bill and the calculation connecting them. The owner must remove specified charges and account for common-area use before allocating the remaining costs. Your apartment’s share is not necessarily a measurement of the water you used. PUC calculation rules

This checklist covers Texas apartment properties with at least five dwelling units, primarily for long-term occupancy, where rent is paid monthly or less frequently. Submetered service measures each unit’s water use; allocated service divides master-metered costs using an authorized method. PUC definitions and scope For broader lease questions, see our practical renting guides.

1. Find the formula in your lease

Gather your signed lease, utility addendum, bill you want to check and any notice changing the billing method. Under the Public Utility Commission of Texas (PUC) rental-agreement rule, the agreement must disclose:

• Whether service is allocated or submetered, and which utilities the owner will bill.
• A clear allocation formula when service is allocated.
• The previous calendar year’s average monthly bill for all dwelling units, plus the highest and lowest month’s bills.
• Billing information, including relevant reading, billing and due dates.
• The owner’s time frame for repairing leaks in your unit and in common areas that are not submetered.
• Your right to information needed to verify charges, and that calculation disputes are between you and the owner.

The owner must also provide the rules when discussing the rental agreement. A label such as “RUBS” (ratio utility billing system) does not, by itself, explain the formula. Look for the factors and percentages needed to reproduce your charge. Section 24.279

Check the bill alongside the agreement. It must identify the service as allocated, distinguish water and wastewater charges, identify applicable base or customer-service charges, and provide a billing-dispute contact. Allocated bills generally must cover the utility’s billing period, except when service covers less than that period. Section 24.283(d)–(f)

2. Check which costs were allocated

Start with the utility’s actual bill to the property owner. A tenant ledger showing only your balance cannot explain how management calculated it.

Water and wastewater charges cannot include the utility’s deposit, disconnect, reconnect, late-payment or similar fees assessed against the owner. Also question a 9% service fee on an allocated charge: the rule’s authorization for that service-charge category applies to submetered service. Section 24.281(a), (d)

Two fixed charges require separate treatment:

• Dwelling-unit base charge: Your unit may receive its applicable utility base charge. Tenants cannot be billed for base charges assigned to vacant units.
• Customer-service charge: Divide this utility charge by all dwelling units that can receive service through the master meter, including vacant units.

These charges come out before the remaining costs are allocated; the permitted unit amounts are billed separately. Section 24.281(b), (c), (e)

Match the common-area deduction to the plumbing

The required adjustment depends on what is metered. Ask which master meter serves your building and how irrigation, pools and laundry rooms are accounted for.

These percentages apply before calculating your apartment’s share. The property’s irrigation and metering arrangement determines which deduction applies. Section 24.281(e)(1)

3. Recalculate your apartment’s share

For apartment houses, permitted allocation factors include actual occupancy, weighted occupancy, a prescribed bedroom-based occupancy formula, a combination of occupancy and square footage, or the unit’s proportion of individually submetered hot- or cold-water use. A meter measuring only part of a unit’s water can therefore supply an allocation factor without measuring its entire consumption.

Under the combined method, square footage may account for no more than 50% of the allocation. That part of the calculation must use the living-area square footage of all dwelling units as the property total. Square footage alone is not one of the apartment-house methods listed in the rule. Section 24.281(e)(2)(A)

Ask management to show both sides of every fraction: your unit’s factor and the property total. Weighted occupancy uses minimum factors specified in the rule; bedroom-based occupancy uses a prescribed scale. Neither should be silently substituted for an actual head count. Check the counting date, too: actual occupancy uses the beginning of the month being billed, while weighted occupancy uses the beginning of the utility’s billing period. Allocation formulas

Hypothetical example: Assume a $4,000 water master bill contains no base charges, customer-service charges or prohibited fees. Common areas are unmetered and an installed irrigation system exists. The owner deducts 25%, leaving $3,000. Under the lease’s permitted actual-occupancy method, your two occupants represent two of 100 occupants counted on the required date. Your allocated water charge is $3,000 × 2 ÷ 100 = $60. Those assumptions explain the charge; they do not establish how many gallons your household consumed.

4. Request records for any missing number

The owner must make records available that let you calculate and verify your water and wastewater bill. Request the records needed to fill gaps in your calculation:

• The utility’s master bills and applicable rate structure.
• The allocation formula, occupancy factors and percentages.
• Total occupants or equivalent occupants used in the calculation.
• Your unit’s square footage and the property total, when size is a factor.
• Monthly totals billed to tenants and revenues collected for water and wastewater.
• Other information needed to verify the charge, such as support for the common-area adjustment.

The rule requires retention for the current year and previous calendar year. Section 24.277(e)–(f)

Send a dated written request and keep proof of delivery. Suggested wording:

Please make available the records needed to verify my allocated water and wastewater charges for the billing period shown on the attached bill, including the master utility bills, applicable rates, common-area deductions, allocation formula and inputs, and monthly tenant billing and collection totals. Please identify where and when I can inspect them.

Access deadlines depend on where the records are kept:

The rule also permits mailing copies if postmarked by the applicable deadline. These provisions do not promise an emailed spreadsheet on demand. Section 24.277(g)

5. Put the discrepancy and requested correction in writing

Identify the billing period, amount charged and specific issue: an unexplained occupancy total, for example, a missing common-area deduction or a vacant-unit base charge. If you are disputing the bill, say so explicitly rather than sending only a records request.

The owner must investigate and report the results in writing within 30 days from the date you give the owner written notice of the dispute. Confirmed errors require billing adjustments. Overcharges must be addressed for every affected bill, and errors affecting all tenants require adjustments for all affected tenants. Section 24.283(k)–(l)

If the issue remains unresolved, you may file a complaint with the PUC concerning a violation of these rules. Keep the lease, bills, requests, calculation and management response together. For advice about your particular dispute or payment obligations, consult a Texas tenant attorney or legal aid organization. PUC complaint jurisdiction

For managers, a calculation tenants can reproduce belongs among routine rental management responsibilities. It also helps distinguish tenant reimbursements from the property’s own multifamily operating costs. A useful response supplies the missing input or identifies the corrected amount and affected billing periods.