High water meter bill - could the supply also be for next door?

[redrabbit]

Hello, firstly, I'm not a plumber but was hoping for some help please?

Long story short... big bill came through for meter. Turned off stopcock, and over 11 hour period it went from 223.514 to 223.537 with the supply off. No signs of flood from outside, no loss of pressure, etc... Water company sent a guy out who was entirely useless - I will ask him to come back.

However, I was wondering...

My house is a maisonette, on top of a flat. See the image below. Houses (in red) have their own doors, and then underneath them are ground floor flats. See pic below.



I noticed tonight whilst searching endlessly for leaks, that the flats don't appear to have any water covers. I do, the other houses shown do - not sure about rest of the road.

Is it possible, that my water pipe, comes INTO underneath's flat, for them, and then up to me - as the pipe where my stopcock is, appears to go down into their flat.

Or is this just not possible?

 

[PlumbBobBob]

hi redrabbit welcome to the forums. the flats may have internal water meters. the next day you are off, turn off your water at the meter and see if anyone comes knocking because of loss of water.

 

[Ch4 plumbing]

You will most likely have separate supplies but your main will rise up through the ground floor flats floor, knock on their door and ask them if they can hear a leak! Had one a couple of years back and ended up taking the bathroom floor up to solve leak.

 

[snowhead]

As the houses above all have ground floor external doors I would have thought the Water Service pipe for each of those would pass up through their own property.

But it's not unusual for Water, Gas and Electric services to pass up through other properties.
It's also not unusual for street stop cocks to get tarmaced over or be lost under grass.

When your meter was fitted they should have proved that it served only your property, note should have.

Assuming you still get no reasonable response from the Water co, as suggested above, turn off your stop tap whenever you can and see if the flat below comments on having no water.

 

[redrabbit]

hi redrabbit welcome to the forums. the flats may have internal water meters. the next day you are off, turn off your water at the meter and see if anyone comes knocking because of loss of water.

I did that last week and no one knocked. However, what I will do later this evening if turn it off, and knock on the downstairs flat to see if their kitchen/bathroom taps are working. Hopefully they aren't! haha

You will most likely have separate supplies but your main will rise up through the ground floor flats floor, knock on their door and ask them if they can hear a leak! Had one a couple of years back and ended up taking the bathroom floor up to solve leak.

As above, think I will knock on the downstairs people and ask them.

As the houses above all have ground floor external doors I would have thought the Water Service pipe for each of those would pass up through their own property.

But it's not unusual for Water, Gas and Electric services to pass up through other properties.
It's also not unusual for street stop cocks to get tarmaced over or be lost under grass.

When your meter was fitted they should have proved that it served only your property, note should have.

Assuming you still get no reasonable response from the Water co, as suggested above, turn off your stop tap whenever you can and see if the flat below comments on having no water.

Thanks for that - very useful information.

I will call the water company again today and speak to them about the issues.

I'm also going to call the housing association. I own the property, but it's leasehold - not freehold. It may also be that my insurance company could assist.

I'm really worried about the cost of all this.

...

Last night I woke up at 2am still thinking about it. I stood around random parts of the house listening for water and heard nothing. I then went outside onto my pathway area to see if I could hear any running water - again, I couldn't.

But then I'm sure it's hard to hear minor leaks.

 

[redrabbit]

Also...

Is there any chance that maybe my stopcock is faulty? I.e. I turn it off, the meter still turns because maybe the tap isn't working that well?

 

[redrabbit]

This is the my meter which is at the end of my pathway. Not sure how I would turn off the water from here though. Doesn't seem to be any obvious taps or things that move around.

 

[AWheating]

just turn off your water and ask the person living in the flat below if they have water.

 

[jtsplumbing]

Turn it off some one may have join'd into your water pipe !by accident of course

 

[Meady]

They may share it as I just worked in some flats (only ground and first floor) the flat below (we were working in this one) had a cold mains to feed their flat but then their hot water cylinder was fed from a tank in the loft of the flat above, but the water main didn't go up there as it was all run surface so you could see.

 

[redrabbit]

Yea - ideally I want to turn water off at the meter but I'm not sure how.


Also, I've left the water on all day, whilst out, leaving an empty house and have two readings:


7am: 224.871
5pm: 224.972


So a bit of movement, not sure how to calculate what that really means though.

 

[kay-jay]

Also...

Is there any chance that maybe my stopcock is faulty? I.e. I turn it off, the meter still turns because maybe the tap isn't working that well?

Doubt it.
In any case a faulty stop tap wouldnt make you consume water unless someone was running taps or flushing bog etc

 

[jtsplumbing]

Call your water supplier, tell them you have a leak, and can't find a external stop tap, it's their responsibility up to and including the meter anything after the meter is down to you.

 

[redrabbit]

Re: High water meter bill - supply also be for next door? (SOLVED??? SEE UPDATE)

UPDATE

OK, so this is my house and neighbours:





If I turn off the outside stop valve - located UNDER the water cover, directly next to the meter... the meter shuts down and it turns all the cold water off in my house.


HOWEVER... it also shuts off all of the flat's downstairs.


... ...


I think The meter is on the supply pipe for both me and downstairs. This would account for such a big bill.


It would also account for why the meter runs all day long, even with my INTERNAL stopcock off - because they are using it!


There are no outside leaks that I can see, no sound of water.


Do you think this all adds up - even with my little knowledge I'm sure it can only mean I'm paying for both our properties supply.


You agree?

 

[snowhead]

Yes
Contact the Water supplier

They'll have to put a meter on your supply within your property and refund you for miss-charging.

 

[Ch4 plumbing]

I'd go along with that, you need to phone your water undertaker and explain this, they should then send someone round to confirm your findings and resolve the issue for you.

 

[redrabbit]

Thanks everyone. They are coming round next Thursday.

Once sorted I plan to write a very strong letter of complaint detailing my issues, especially with being misled with regards to the original issue.

I will also ask for compensation, not only for the time I've spent, but stress in trying to find a leak that never existed and worrying constantly for the last 6 weeks about loss of water and money.

Additionally, I've spent money on plumbers, tools trying to fix leaks INSIDE the house which were not even an issue - albeit, probably did need fixed.

Either way, I do think it's incredibly poor that they stuck a meter in without checking, and have done the same on a neighbouring house.

 

[rpm]

Had a friend once who couldn`t work out why the water bill was so high when they were often working away, turns out it wasn`t her meter.

 

[Centralheatking]

Hi redrabbit - here are the accepted uk mains water consumption figures from an expert

per person per day in uk we on average consume 145 litres each -
wrinklies use less (10%) and young families lots more Centralheatking

Hello, firstly, I'm not a plumber but was hoping for some help please?

Long story short... big bill came through for meter. Turned off stopcock, and over 11 hour period it went from 223.514 to 223.537 with the supply off. No signs of flood from outside, no loss of pressure, etc... Water company sent a guy out who was entirely useless - I will ask him to come back.

However, I was wondering...

My house is a maisonette, on top of a flat. See the image below. Houses (in red) have their own doors, and then underneath them are ground floor flats. See pic below.

View attachment 17548

I noticed tonight whilst searching endlessly for leaks, that the flats don't appear to have any water covers. I do, the other houses shown do - not sure about rest of the road.

Is it possible, that my water pipe, comes INTO underneath's flat, for them, and then up to me - as the pipe where my stopcock is, appears to go down into their flat.

Or is this just not possible?