What do you think this might point to?

[WaterTight]

My mum recently moved into a bungalow. Starts getting high water bills. They then tell her she's averaging 500 litres used a day so I go to investigate.

No obvious leaks. It's a combi so could only be hot and cold leaking and it's solid floors with no pipes (that I can tell from initial snooping) in the floor at all. All pipes seem to be run up and down from loft with a few running behind boxing here and there. No damp patches, mould, no sounds of water/drips, checked usual stuff like inlet/drop valves, outside taps, behind washing machine.

I looked at meter when nothing being used and it was moving very slowly

I told her to take readings over periods of time when not using it to see how much 'usage' the leak was accounting for. But this is when it got confusing. ..

Yesterday she was out of the house during the day for 10 hours and it registered 40 litres had been used on the meter while she was away. However the day before - overnight for 12 hours - the water wasn't used and it registered no change. Zero movement, exactly same reading as 12 hours previously.

Bit of a weird leak that can do that? Faulty meter? Just wondering if this points to something before I start removing boxing, looking further.

Thanks

 

[WaterTight]

Should have said I turned off the internal stopcock when I noticed the meter slowly moving on it's own and it stopped moving (although i didn't watch it for a long time) which I think should discount the only underground part of the supply I'm aware of. The rest is above ground in the house. I traced all the pipework in the loft I could (95% i'd say as full of crap and all lagged) and found no leaks there either.

 

[Welder]

First thing Id do is turn off stopcock in the house. That isolates the supply pipework and lets you know if in ground to prop or property itself.

A leak MAY be covered to some extent by insurance. Often have trace & access clauses.

 

[rpm]

Dodgy neighbours? Have a peek over the fence for a pipe that is out of place.

 

[WaterTight]

First thing Id do is turn off stopcock in the house. That isolates the supply pipework and lets you know if in ground to prop or property itself.

A leak MAY be covered to some extent by insurance. Often have trace & access clauses.

Yeah I did that and meter stopped, but didn't have time to check it for long.
And yes indeed to second part too, I had my front path dug up this morning on my insurance to fix a bit of galvanised.

Dodgy neighbours? Have a peek over the fence for a pipe that is out of place.

Wouldn't they have to tee into supply after my mum's meter though? Her meter is in her garden.

 

[sammathias]

Connect onto her outside tap when she's off out for the day?