Regulator says high call-out charges fees will be reduced

Irish Water will be forced to reduce the exorbitant call-out fees it wants to charge householders with service and supply problems after the energy regulator expressed concern about how high they had been set.

The regulator also stressed that the fees — which start at €188 for a daytime call-out — had not been approved and said anyone charged them would get a rebate of the excess they paid when the new fees were determined.

“We have expressed concern,” Paul McGowan, senior official with the Commission for Energy Regulation (CER), told the Oireachtas environment committee. “We have not signed off on any call-out charges.”