I had an extremely frustrating experience with Vallecitos Water District regarding a duplicate payment of $144.96. When I called to request a refund for the extra charge, I was told they would only offer an account credit. When I insisted on a refund to my card, I was informed that the request would have to be reviewed by the Board and could take up to seven weeks to process as a check. When I mentioned that I would contact my bank to resolve the duplicate charge, the representative used scare tactics, claiming that doing so would result in my card being blocked from future payments and threatened "consequences." Using such intimidation methods instead of resolving a simple billing error is completely unacceptable. I am appalled by this lack of service and the unprofessional, threatening behavior of the staff. This is an entirely unreasonable way to handle a clear duplicate payment!!! They messed with the wrong person! read more

The increase from tier one to tier two pricing is reasonable. But when you hit tier 3 you better have your seat belt buckled. Unfair and usurious. No surrounding cities' water rates advance like Vallecitos. Should be reported to the PUC. read more

Look, there's never a perfect time for an emergency. When the water main burst in our complex last month Vallecitos Water was super responsive in coming to our humble hood in the middle of the of the night to make it right. I mean, shit happens and it's how you respond to it that counts. Yeah, it sucked not having water for over five hours but whatchagonnado? The workers who came out seriously worked all through the night to get us some temporary water lines. They were incredibly respectful and quiet considering it was 3 am and by morning we had running water again (which was a huge relief considering I ate 2 rice beans & cheese burritos from Robertos for dinner)! Over the next few weeks they had to dig up our street and VWD was very accommodating with minimizing the noise and traffic. Their workers were diligent and friendly while having to deal with cranky neighbors and really worked to accommodate everyone. It seems like they have a thankless job however I am very appreciative of their efforts. I am thankful that the disruptions were minimal and that everything is back to normal now. Whew! read more

We called their emergency line on Memorial Day at 8 a.m. because we found a lot of water in our water bulb box. A very kind lady from security picked up right away and told us that a technician would call us back shortly. Within five minutes, the dispatcher, Veincent, called us and was extremely polite. He offered to come to our house to check the issue, and to our surprise, he arrived just 10 minutes later. He quickly diagnosed the problem and informed us that they would return to fix it within two weeks. The entire process took only 30 minutes--what amazing service! Also, I want to mention the friendly front desk lady at the San Marcos office. I've visited a couple of times to make payments in person and avoid late fees. The office is always super clean and well-organized. Thank you all for your excellent work and outstanding service! read more

I've been a customer since I moved to San Marcos in 2011. I have never had an issue with service, billing, or payments, and therefore I have not had a need to engage with customer service. That being said, I did attend the recent Water Academy and got to meet the folks behind the scenes who maintain, repair, clean, and update the hundreds of miles of water and wastewater pipelines, pumps, lift stations, and other facilities throughout the district. I'm happy to know there are some very cool, friendly, and experienced people who work around the clock to keep things humming along. In addition to that, VWD has a drought tolerant and native California plants garden in front of the office with a seed library. Residents are free to use and donate seeds to the library. Friendly employees and volunteers maintain the garden and are happy to provide landscaping advice and ideas. I met VWD Board, the GM, engineers, and others. All were more than willing to listen to the issues of everyone in attendance and fielded a variety of questions. I'd highly recommend doing the annual tour if you can. We switched to more drought tolerant landscaping years ago and are pretty conscientious of our total water usage. Rates are what they are (and much higher than the Midwest), but we use way less air conditioning and heating than the rest of the country. In the grand scheme of things, paying pennies per gallon for clean water in a coastal desert doesn't seem all that bad! read more

I saw some excessive water in my neighborhood and contacted the city who then contacted Vallecitos to let them know. I felt that the response was very quick. They sent someone out to check out the situation and assured me that it would be handled. I've checked the area and it already looks better. Hopefully the leak portion gets taken care of by the homeowner quickly as well. read more

These guys are the worst. One of Vallecitos Water District's water lines broke in our little cul de sac in La Costa -- 100 percent their fault -- and they notified NO ONE as to what they are doing. One morning they just show up -- trash day no less -- and block off the passage. And when the neighbors went to discuss this, they said, "too bad, this is how it is" and shut down further discussion. Horrible customer service. Horrible communication. Horrible attitude. Hope these workers encounter someone just like them at some point in their lives. Vallecitos Water District workers are absolutely the worst. read more

I don't even know where to start with these crooks. They will do anything to charge you fees. I made a payment online and 8 hours later I have a notice on my door - one that costs me an additional $25 because "their systems take 48 hours to update". This is 2017 and there's no reason their system can't take a payment and update the account to "payment pending" until the payment clears. To me it sounds like a way for them to "tax" the people who wait to pay until the last few days.it definitely doesn't help people going thru hard times IE disability, low income, unemployed to charge an additional $25 to leave a piece of paper on your door. When calling they are totally unreasonable and unwilling to work with you if you've had this issue before. Strongly considering moving just to avoid these guys. Oh yeah, and if you're unemployed for 9 months from a disability (like how I was before this current situation) and ask for an extension to pay, they'll still come and lock your meter - therefore tacking another $100 fee to a bill that is already a struggle to pay. read more

I actually enjoy paying my bill when I walk in here. The facility is really nice, and pretty. I have been a part of this district for six years now and in the begining as a struggling single mom I remember how kind and helpful and UNDERSTANDING the customer service ladies are. They don't/wont bend the rules but when you need to have some extra time they will help you as much as they can so you do not get disconnected. Thanks for all the patience customer service/billing dept. read more

Called their office and lady who answered the phone and after relating our problem finding the cleanout pipe said they had someone nearby and would get them over. He understood our problem and made a couple suggestions. Was very professional and friendly...now to go about fixing our need. read more

Why can't you take debt card payments over the phone? This is absolutely ridiculous! Not quick to take payments during covid? If you could shut ppl off you'd be on moving quickly to lock me out and collect that ridiculous reinstatement fee! Shame on you! read more

Matthew (truck 203) is an excellent employee. I'm very glad you have him as a part of Vallecitos.

Customer service :( I have never been talked to like that or been made to feel so small by any customer service agent ever. She literally made me feel like the biggest loser ever in the midst of an extremely difficult time for our family. read more

If having the option to get water from a well that is riddled with disease and snakes were available to me, I would take it 100 times out of 100 as opposed to having to work with VWD. You call to set up your initial service and you think everything will be great because why wouldn't a dealing with a simple municipal water district and their online billing platform be anything other. Nayy, its a far more nefarious endeavor than you would expect. After the initial call where the woman who's name I wont mention (rhymes with Schmenifer) walks you through the auto payment set up and making your initial payment from your checking account. She will then tell you that you need to make sure you do it exactly following her instructions or it wont register properly. Luckily for me and smchenifer I possess a 2nd grade education so following simple instructions without much brain damage is an accomplishable task for me. Once I got the confirmation I was enrolled in online billing and my first payment was confirmed I figured I was all good. This is where I made my fatal mistake. I went on living my life until one day a few months later the FedEx delivery lady shows up at my house with an overnighted package from VWD. She told me I needed to pay my water bill which was super embarrassing as I always want to remain in high standing with my delivery ppl as I hope to one day maybe have a poker night or some block party with them like they have in a lot of sitcoms. I digress, I open the package to see that my account is delinquent for the last two months and that they have assessed a $25 fee to my account which I later found out was for the fedex overnight packaging (don't even get me started on that). On top of that if I didn't pay in the next 2 days they would fine me $150 and send a couple of (what I have imagined to be similar to the MONstars from Space Jam) their guys to come turn off my water and possibly break my arm (this is not likely but hey it could happen). So I calmly call VWD hoping to get Schmenifer back on the phone but this time I get a very feisty new representative whom I wont name either (rhymes with Schmaria). I could tell within the first couple of seconds that this was going to be a heavyweight bout and we were both going to battling to see who came out on top. I expressed my concern and frustration and politely asked that they remove the $25 fee for the fedex label from my account and I would gladly bring it current (again I thought I was on autopay). She stated that unfortunately for me, they cant do that. I asked her why wasn't my account auto paid like I had set up with her colleague not that many moons ago? She said it looked like I had successfully signed up for online pay and had set up the auto pay feature but that I needed to go back in and click one little "sign up" button. Evidently, I was told to do this but clearly I don't follow directions as well as I thought... read more

Sorry Lisa, I spoke with one of your supervisors didn't change a thing and was hung up on. You can post on here that you would like to "help" trying to save face, but you and I both know it won't change a thing. read more

we sold our rental property in San Marcos - while the house was in escrow, it was vacant. During that one month period, Vallecitos water claimed that we used 30,000 gallons of water. We had no leaks, there were no broken sprinkler heads, no manifold issues at the water main, none of the neighbors ran hoses from our house to theirs to fill up their pools. Vallecitos just either never bothered to read our meter properly, or didn't record it properly in the past when we had tenants living there. The supervisor (Elissia S) was MIA for WEEKS - she was either sick, on vacation, or just out of the office, so they just kept blowing us off - they kept telling us she'd be back in on such and such date - nope. Either way, we're getting stuck with their mistake. We're a cautionary tale - be sure to keep an eye on your bills, make sure that they read your meters carefully and stay on top of your bills because they're in this for the $$$$. read more

We've been in our house almost 14 years. Our Oct bill was more than double our usual amount - although it had been creeping up slightly for a while. Our Nov bill was almost four time the usual amount and I was convinced we were getting ripped off. Our neighbors on both sides were saying their bills were unusually high too. I talked to the desk at Vallecitos and they said it looks like we might have a leak somewhere and told me how to check. We checked everything we could, but since our landscaping water had been shut off, once again I was certain that I was being ripped off. I called Vallecitos again after our huge Nov bill and the lady asked if I heard any water running from our toilet tanks. I hadn't, but I picked up the free blue tablets from Vallecitos to put in the tanks to check. Imagine how humbled I was to find that we had leaky toilet flappers throughout the house. I replaced all the flappers and our Dec bill was surprising low! Just got our Jan bill and it was normal usage too! I wasn't being ripped off by anyone - my toilets were running and I never heard them. The leaky toilet flappers wasted a HUGE amount of water and that's what I got billed for. The water company was helpful to me throughout my entire ordeal - and despite my suspicions, they weren't ripping me off! Very humbling :) Thanks Vallecitos! read more