Automatic meter reading, or AMR, is the technology of automatically collecting consumption, diagnostic, and status data from water meter

Water meter

A water meter is a device used to measure the volume of water usage. This article provides an overview of technical aspects of water meters. The worldwide prevalence of metering as well as its economic benefits and costs are covered in the separate article on water metering.In many developed...

 or energy metering devices (gas, electric) and transferring that data to a central database for billing, troubleshooting, and analyzing.
This technology mainly saves utility providers the expense of periodic trips to each physical location to read a meter.