A Charleswood man is raising concerns about automated bill payments after his mother was charged an outrageous amount — nearly $150,000 — on her city water bill.
Tim Martin got an email Wednesday saying the bank account of his mother, Dorothy, was massively overdrawn. She is a senior on a fixed income, said Martin of the 86-year-old.
Initially he thought the email was a phishing scam.
But after doing some digging he realized it was legitimate.
“I have online banking privileges to be able to view my mom’s account,” said Martin. “I went online and found that indeed there was an overdrawn account, and it was a debit of $146,000 by the City of Winnipeg’s water and waste department.”
Martin went to his mother’s bank and had the alarming charge reversed after filling out some paperwork.
Martin believes his mother submitted an incorrect meter reading.
He called the city to ask about the error, they told him the overcharge was a consequence of using an automated system.
He said the city needs to be more responsible for the systems they use to collect payments, and they should flag anomalies when billing.
“There certainly should be some sort of a threshold at which there’s human intervention,” said Martin.
“Perhaps $1,000, $10,000, $100,000? But in this case, $146,000-plus, and it’s just processed on somebody’s account, where their typical billing was $118 per billing period? I’m just surprised at the lack of oversight.”
City still charging NSF fee
Martin submitted a new meter reading to the City of Winnipeg, and is waiting for a new bill, but said the city is still going to charge his mother an NSF fee because she didn’t have enough money in her account for the $146,000 payment to clear.
“The first thing that they said to me was, ‘Oh, you’re going to have to pay a 30-some-dollar NSF fee for this bill not going through,” said Martin.
“And I said, ‘In what sort of reasonable world would you have expected that a pre-authorized debit for $146,000 to somebody’s personal account would not go NSF?'”
CanAge is a Toronto-based national seniors’ advocacy organization. CEO Laura Tamblyn-Watts said it’s shocking that a bill this large wasn’t flagged, and it raises questions about what protections are in place.
“With our rapidly-aging population, we know that we need more financial support and protections, particularly for people who may be less familiar with online bill-paying technologies,” said Tamblyn-Watts.
“It also makes you wonder if something as egregious as this [bill payment] has gone through, how many other smaller ones have gone through that have never been caught?”
She said financial errors like these can lead to large financial losses for seniors over time, and that Manitoba needs to update its consumer-protection legislation.
“That means that you would have more rights to push back against companies. It also means that companies have the obligation to not let these things happen, to notify you when they do, and to make sure that your money comes back.”
Tamblyn-Watts said even though Manitoba is lagging in the arena of consumer protection laws, its NDP government has said it’s an area where they want to improve. She hopes Manitoba follows in the footsteps of the Ontario government, who just implemented some of the strictest consumer legislation in the country.
In a statement to CBC, a city spokesperson said they had been in contact with Martin’s mother.
“We work with property owners to resolve issues regarding their utility bill and we have been in contact with this customer,” a spokesperson said.
There are procedures in place for “large bill” situations like this one, the statement said.
“We contact a customer by phone and mail if their bill seems larger than their previous consumption history would suggest, prior to billing the account. A larger than expected bill could be indicative of a water leak or simply an error with a supplied meter reading.
“This is why it is important for customers to know how to read their water meter and submit accurate readings,” the city said.
Martin said he’s re-evaluating whether he wants to use pre-authorized payments for his mother’s finances.
“I had no idea that when you sign a pre-authorized debit agreement, that you’re so vulnerable to overcharges without any oversight on the part of either the party that’s making the demand for payment or the bank that’s processing the payment. That’s absolutely frightening.”
A Winnipeg man says his elderly mother was charged nearly $150,000 on her city water bill, resulting in her bank account being massively overdrawn.