BILLINGS — The City of Billings sent out a letter to homeowners last week, outlining a proposed July 2026 rate increase for water and wastewater fees along with plan to impose late fees for unpaid bills starting July 2025.
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For 10 months, the City of Billings offered customers a grace period on late payments, following issues with transitions to a new billing software.
Ultimately, the problems led to the city hiring an independent firm to audit its water metering system. In February, the results came back from that audit showing that there was no evidence of systematic overbilling.
The audit did find that there were mistakes made with the transition to the new billing software, which led to confusion. It's a circumstance that City Administrator Chris Kukulski is fully aware of.
"That software conversion did not go as well as we wanted it to and needed it to," Kukulski said. "That caused a lot of issues."
With the audit results finalized, Kukulski and the city are trying to move forward. He said that's why the letter explaining the proposed 2 percent rate increase was sent out last week, adding that those rates are reviewed every couple of years as standard procedure.
"The 2 percent for next year is all critical to funding capital," Kukulski said. "Worst case scenario is we ignore that stuff and our assets deteriorate."
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The rate increase won't take effect until July of 2026. Kukulski said the City Council opted to not increase rates this year in part because of the chaos of the software changeover.
"It's hard on people. People would prefer that there not be adjustments," Kukulski said. "Like I said, the worst thing we could do is ignore taking care of those assets."
Still, Billings residents aren't thrilled with the news of potentially higher bills. Jeremiah Fisher is among the many who feel that they've been overcharged in the past year.
"I think just general frustration," Fisher said, when asked about his feelings toward the situation. "When you're looking at quadrupled rates with no explanation and you reach out and you don't get an explanation, it's really frustrating."
Fisher claims that he has paid what he considers to be a normal amount each month, but he isn't paying the additional costs as determined by the city because he doesn't think it's accurate. Consequently, the city says Fisher owes $995 as the difference.
"We made payments that line up with our payments in past years," Fisher said. "That's what we felt like was fair."
Now, Fisher said he fears what will happen this summer if his bill remains unpaid.
"Having that idea that the water could be turned off with no great explanation is tough," Fisher said. "There's no problem here, according to our city. It's really frustrating."
Another Billings resident, Cassidy Burkhardt, is also working to finish paying off old bills. Burkhardt said it's been an exhausting process since it began.
"Concern, panic and now I'm just frustrated," Burkhardt said. "Water is essential. You can't live your life without water."
Burkhardt said her bill jumped from the typical amount, and that's when she started to be wary.
"It had consistently been $60 a month and then it jumped to over $100," Burkhardt said. "I was like, 'Oh, this is wrong.'"
Burkhardt said the situation has felt helpless at times — with an increase in bills on the horizon.
“There’s nothing we can do," Burkhardt said. "There’s nothing we can say to them to make it listen to us. I’ll fight it for as long as I can, but what are you going to do?"
