Six to 18 months ahead of the schedule it had promised when it acquired the Falls Church Water System last year, the Board of Directors of the Fairfax Water System voted Thursday to equalize water rates for customers previously served by the City of Falls Church with the rates of Fairfax Water “legacy system” customers, resulting in 20 to 40 percent savings on the water portion of a quarterly bill for customers previously served by the City. The same applied to Fairfax’s acquisition of the City of Fairfax water system. The new policy will begin with meter readings taken on or after July 1, 2015. The development was reported this Friday by the City of Falls Church’s Office of Communications.

“Efforts over the last year-and-a-half to fully integrate these system and capture efficiencies and economics of scale have been successful to the point that rate equalization was accelerated and former City customers will enjoy lower water commodity rates accordingly,” the City statement said.