Abnormally high water usage - need ideas

[Hugo145]

Hello,
Not strictly plumbing, but need your advice nonetheless as I'm out of ideas.

We have recently moved into newly renovated apartment (victorian house converted into flats) with new individual smart meters under the pavement. According to the meter our monthly usage is about 20-25 m3 of water (700-800 litres per day) with just me, my wife and 6 month old daughter living in here.
We don't take bath, only shower (every other day), we've also got washing machine running 1-2 times a week and dishwasher running daily. Comparing this to others I feel like water usage is too high.

We had Thames Water engineer come over who checked that meter is indeed ours and water stops flowing when it's shut but he didn't perform any other checks. He also said if there was a leak then meter would show that but it didn't. When we were away for 2 weeks (with main input vent OPEN in our flat) the meter correctly didn't accrue anything so I tend to agree there's no obvious leak.
Also, according to this engineer we should be able to see per-hour breakdown of our usage on their website, but I only see manual datapoints entered every couple of months by inspectors.

I've done a one-off manual test filling 5 litre bottle with cold water and meter correctly reflected this. Is there any way to ask Thames Water to check the meter is accurate?
What can possibly use so much water? Toilet flushing? Could it theoretically be something to do with gas boiler?
Any ideas where to look further appreciated.

Thank you,
Igor.

 

[phloaw]

Hello,
Not strictly plumbing, but need your advice nonetheless as I'm out of ideas.

We have recently moved into newly renovated apartment (victorian house converted into flats) with new individual smart meters under the pavement. According to the meter our monthly usage is about 20-25 m3 of water (700-800 litres per day) with just me, my wife and 6 month old daughter living in here.
We don't take bath, only shower (every other day), we've also got washing machine running 1-2 times a week and dishwasher running daily. Comparing this to others I feel like water usage is too high.

We had Thames Water engineer come over who checked that meter is indeed ours and water stops flowing when it's shut but he didn't perform any other checks. He also said if there was a leak then meter would show that but it didn't. When we were away for 2 weeks (with main input vent OPEN in our flat) the meter correctly didn't accrue anything so I tend to agree there's no obvious leak.
Also, according to this engineer we should be able to see per-hour breakdown of our usage on their website, but I only see manual datapoints entered every couple of months by inspectors.

I've done a one-off manual test filling 5 litre bottle with cold water and meter correctly reflected this. Is there any way to ask Thames Water to check the meter is accurate?
What can possibly use so much water? Toilet flushing? Could it theoretically be something to do with gas boiler?
Any ideas where to look further appreciated.

Thank you,
Igor.

I'd do more tests running different parts separately (e.g., CH, HW, appliances, whatever could use water) for some time, and checking the meter each time.

 

[rpm]

The most usual culprit is the cistern flush valve letting a trickle of water run into the pan. Dry around the rim then lay single sheets under the rim and see if any become wet.

 

[Chuck]

Assuming you are taking 'normal' showers, not long power showers, you are using three or four times what I'd expect (200-250 litres /day)

 

[snowhead]

My first thought is that although Thames Water checked that the meter is mechanically connected to your apartment have they checked that it is the meter assigned to your account that's used for charging.
With multiple meters probably coming live at the same time it would have been easy to get some mixed up.

If it's showing manual readings on the account you must be outside the Wide area network and so have a walk by reading collection, in which case you can't get flow readings for hour by hour usage. (from T-W website)

 

[WC1]

If its a conversion, depending how well it was done, sometimes part of another property can be fed by your supply.
Have you taken a daily reading of your and neighbours meters for a few days?
It is "strictly plumbing " btw