Water company 'detected' leak – should I be worried?

We have had a letter and a phone call with the water board who have detected a leak. They’ve been next door and it is not there. It is a leak to the clean water supply.

I’m worried it is under our kitchen as there is an extension that goes over the mains. Our plumber said he could hear something a few months back, but advised us to leave it unless we had problems with it.

If it is under the house, what happens?

Are we compelled to let the water company do whatever they need to fix it?

Are there non-destructive options we can make them use?

They did a similar thing to our in-laws – although they ‘made good’ the hole in their new patio, it was basically just pacthed up with cement – I don’t want our kitchen floor etc just bodged back together on the cheap!

We’ve got two young children – major disruption to the house is not good!

Any advise would be great as I’m in uncharted waters (pun intended) here.

Depending on the company you have a number of options

1. Check the website for any free repair policy, probably won’t cover inside the property

2. Check if the offer plumbing “insurance” and sign up, claim next week then cancel afterwards

3. Get a plumber

4. Wait to they take you to court and gain entry to compulsory repair the leak (they have these powers)

Btw, your plumber is a good reason for enforcing compulsory metering 😉

And your plumber clearly doesn’t care about house subsidence. If it’s big enough for the water folk to have noticed it’s probably very big and eating your foundations away right as you read this.

although they ‘made good’ the hole in their new patio, it was basically just pacthed up with cement

That’s not “made good” then, that’s bodged.

danny – is this in scotland or elsewhere in the UK? I’ve worked in scotland – arranging this sort of work. if it’s the supply pipe that comes in from the stop cock outside then that’s the householder’s responsibility. have they said it’s this or is it an older house where in rarer cases you can find a water mains pipe (water board’s responsibility) within a customer’s property boundary.

either way, it’s probably in your interests to have it sorted by a plumber or the water board before your pressure plummets. i’ve dealt with cases whereby people leave these things for a few months and then their water pressure can be practically non-existent. have you noticed any pressure changes?

i’d call their cust services and ask for information on what sort of pipe it is and what their leakage detection policy is.

As far as I’m aware it’s a private service from your boundary so you are responsible. Couple of other questions. Is it a joint supply, ie one boundary stop tap supplying more than one property, how old is the property/supply, are you on lead or mdpe(plastic).
My main concern would be erosion under the founds of the property to be fair, so it does need sorting! How was the leak noticed first off by the way??

Sorry after reading that again are you stating that it’s a street/town main that’s leaking and not your individual service?? If that’s the case then definitely get it sorted ASAP as it could be causing all kinds of issues below ground.

If it’s a water main you’ll be demolishing your kitchen extension.

Sounds like a joint/common supply with your spur leaking.

Option 2 is your friend

You can probably claim for it all under house insurance, check your policy…

They come round our street every few yearscand moan about leaks and piss about with the water supply then never do anything. I think they are trying to drum up insurance business.

House insurance as above. Check it out as it should be covered.

Also.

Your plumber is an idiot. Get a new one ASAP.

If it’s under your building it could be a serious problem. It would depend mostly on geology and where the leak is relative to your foundations, and how big the leak is.

Best to check your building insurance, as others have said.

If the leak is in the garden from the main street stop tap under a plastic or iron flap on the footway, then its your problem if before that its the water companys problem, if its under the house floor you just divert it, by adding a juction outside the house and run a new feed to the inside stop tap.

To check switch off water at stop tap, and aply a large screwdiver nead to the tap, and put your ear to the handle, if you can hear wooshing youve got a leak.

Oh and if its under the conscrete raft of the house it could be undermining the raft,by washing a way the soil.

Extension over the mains? Are you sure you could build there? Good chance there’s an easement which prohibits building over the mains. However, my knowledge is from a different utility.

I sometimes wonder if people ever read the posts above? 🙄

I’m not at all sure what the situation is – not good, but true.

I don’t think it is a main as such – perhaps a spur as above. I have not noticed any drop in pressure – we have a combi boiler, so I guess it would be more obvious because of this(?)

The house is old – c. 90 years, so we could be in trouble with cracked or collapsed lead pipes here.

The leak was first noticed by the plumber when he was doing something – he was behind the washing machine, and could hear a very faint hiss – other than that I don’t know.

The plumbing on our house seems to be ‘interesting’ to say the least – the plumber kept saying things like “yes, that works, but it’s not the way it would be done nowadays” etc.

Home insurance again – aaaaargh! In February, my daughter and I were watching the start of Italy v England in the Six Nations and one of our kitchen cabinets just fell off the wall, onto the microwave before detonating on the kitchen floor. We’ve only just settled this with the insurance – yet they pay out in no time to people who chuck a glass of wine over their carpet because they want a new one!!!!

They also played the game about some very large old trees in our neighbour’s garden – hinting that it might invalidate the insurance before tapping us up to renew with extra cover as a result, whilst holding the existing claim over us.

In one way, I hope it’s not the old lady next door – she’s constantly being messed aroung by tradesmen – the best scenario is that it is under the outside of the house…….

where do you live?

Perhaps I should expand on my comment. If there is an easement and you’ve built on it in the past, they could exercise their legal right and dig. They normally don’t, It’s not worth the legal cost and bad pr but just be aware that if that is the case, try appealing to the better nature of whoever you deal with.

If it’s coming from your supply (ie within your property), it’s your responsibility, and the water company can serve a notice basically telling you to sort it out within a short period (couple of weeks I think) or they’ll come and do it for you, and charge you for it.

I would have thought that rather than dig up your kitchen, they would disconnect the existing supply, dig a new trench and reconnect a new one. That’s what they were proposing for my Stepdad’s mum, anyhow.

Best thing is to have a conversation with them ASAP, get them over, and find out where you stand.

The local Water company here [Northumbrian] knocked on our door and said there was a leak somewhere between the stop cock on the pavement and where it enters the house – in the kitchen at the back.
The pipe goes up the drive which at one point has a bedroom built over it.

First off they said the leak was close to the kitchen but they would fix it FOC as it’s their policy to offer one FOC repair per customer, after lots of digging, they failed to find it.
They [poorly] back filled the hole and made good [Ha !!] the drive and left.
Second team arrive and claim the first lot were wrong and the leak is near the road and proceed to pretty much do what the first lot did in the new location, with the same result, they too cleared off without a clue.
Third team arrive and claim that the leak is actually where the drive goes under the house – which they won’t touch – and served me with a notice to get it fixed.
So I called out a thrust boring company to come and simply replace it all, the guy who turns up does some checks and informs me that the leak is on next doors pipe not ours.
Water company comes back to check that the work has been done and then issues me with a final notice for non-compliance and refuses to be drawn on the state the drive has been left in
At which point I refused them any further right of access without a court order

This was all 2 years ago, still waiting for their next move
I’ve since made good the drive myself

If it’s under your building it could be a serious problem.

Then again it might not. Just fit a new pipe between the bits you can get to easily, and leave the old one where it is. It’s a possibility. 🙂

Thrustboring a new pipe in is quite cheap

We were quoted £600 for a 20m run + a 90 degree turn and a further 3m
Saves digging trenches etc.

You claimed for a kitchen cupboard falling off the wall and damaging a microwave? Eeek! (unless it was filled with your best cut glass wine glasses etc)

You should bump up your excess to remove the temptation to make small claims…I’ve always seen my house/contents insurance to be a last resort. To be claimed upon for stuff like house fire, subsidence, burglary, flooding. I’m not even sure I’d claim for a £1k bike, though if it was more expensive than that or the whole lot got cleared out I would.

spooky b329

I only briefly mentioned the house insurance thing as an aside.

The cabinet had the majority of a new dinner service in it. It not only took out the microwave, but also put a hole in the wood floor and gouged a groove in a wooden work surface.

There was also a strip light attached to the bottom of the cupboard – the flex attached to this ripped a load of tiles off of the wall as well.

If people can claim for a new carpet when they’ve just been damn clumsy (or chucked wine over it deliberately), I’m sure as hell going to claim for something totally random like this!