Get a rebate on your sewerage rates charges

rainman66 · 4 May 2006 at 2:05PM

Here's a good one. Did you know that if your house's rainwater pipes are not connected to any sewer (i.e. only to a ground water soakaway) you can get a rate reduction on the waste discharge part of your water rates.

Thames Water automatically assume you are connected to their system and charge you for processing rainwater falling onto your property and then on into their system. I'd guess the rest do the same. There are 100,000's of houses up and down the country, in towns and city as well as more commonly in rural areas that have no rainwater conenction. It tends to be on older properties but new estates also have communial soakaways too.

They don't advertise you can get this discount. I contacted Thames Water and got a £17 per annum rebate. Took one phone call to do it.

Easy money saved.

cookiemonster25 · 4 May 2006 at 3:17PM

welcome rainman, good spot:D

Cardew · 4 May 2006 at 3:51PM

Welcome,

This has been covered a number of times;

More detail here.

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=125105

rabialiones · 17 June 2006 at 6:31PM

how do you know if your drainpiopes are connected to a sewer or not?

Cardew · 17 June 2006 at 7:17PM

rabialiones wrote:

how do you know if your drainpiopes are connected to a sewer or not?

Look at plans if you can. Local council, builder etc. Speak to your water company.

If not find and remove a cover on the sewer that serves your house and run a hose pipe into a gutter and see if the water is reaching the sewer.

Nearly all new properties have their surface water into soakaways - it became mandatory years ago.

Happy_saver_4 · 20 June 2006 at 3:36PM

Cardew wrote:

Nearly all new properties have their surface water into soakaways - it became mandatory years ago.

Although mandatory and enforced by Council inspection some Water Companies still charge you for accepting your surface water :mad:

If a Company , knowingly charge you for a service they do not supply to you, what do you call it?

Theft, robbery, scam, fraud, taking money under false pretences ????????????

If I charged people for a service I knew I didn't provide I think I would soon be in Court. Why not the Waterboards

Oh sure, you can claim back some of the fraudulently taken money ( if you know about it) they've currentlly offered to return me 6.5% of the money so taken. I suppose it's protecting their shareholders :rotfl: :rotfl:

oldwiring · 20 June 2006 at 5:41PM

This is from the Wessex Water website

Do you qualify?
The sewerage charge you pay includes the cost of removing and treating surface water. This is the water that falls on your roof or the hard paved surfaces of your property.

You may be entitled to an allowance if you receive sewerage services from Wessex Water and you can answer yes to BOTH of these questions:

• does all the rainwater from your roof or shared roof drain into a soakaway both at the front and rear of your property?

• does all the rainwater from your garden, drive, patio or yard run off into the soil?

You DO NOT qualify if:

• part of your surface water goes to a soakaway

• you use a water butt but have no soakaways

• the water from your roof runs indirectly to the sewer, eg, across the pavement.

A soakaway is where water from your roof, etc, is piped to a large underground pit filled with gravel within the boundary of the property, normally 10 to 15 feet away from the house foundations.

Most properties are connected to a public sewer and are not entitled to the allowance, particularly town houses and houses built in the last 40 years.

Elsewhere I have seen reference to draining directly or indirectly to the company's sewerage system. Quite an imortsnt word is that word indireclt IMO.

Happy_saver_4 · 20 June 2006 at 10:03PM

Hi Oldwiring,

"You qualify if:-" as stated by the Waterboard.

My point is that there is no question as to whether some new properties qualify or not. The waterboard have insisted and ensured by Council inspection that the new property does comply. Then knowing the compliance they persist in making a charge and wait to see if you make a claim for rebate.

In other words they are going to wait and see if you notice they are charging you for a service they have refused to supply. If so, they will then offer a refund - in my case 6.5%. The refund offer is backdated to the April of the year in which the claim was made. Not to when they started fraudulently charging. :mad:

Cardew · 20 June 2006 at 11:23PM

oldwiring wrote:

This is from the Wessex Water website

Most properties are connected to a public sewer and are not entitled to the allowance, particularly town houses and houses built in the last 40 years.

Most properties are connected to a public sewer for sewerage, including water from taps etc.

However we are talking about surface drainage water here. e.g. water from gutters and rain falling on garden and paths etc.

In the last(??) years I believe building regulations have made it mandatory for surface drainage water to go the soakaways(unless there were special circumstances) and thus many modern homes would be entitled to the rebate.

Happy_saver_4 · 23 June 2006 at 5:42PM

I'm pleased to advise that Welsh Water have now apologized for their mistake and offered a full refund dating back dated to 2003 of monies wrongly taken.

I still think it's fraudulent for a waterboard to charge for a service they have refused to supply.

Waterboards are going to continue falsely charging customers until the customer realizes the error and claims a refund etc. :mad:

I think it's about time Martin got onto this fraud. :money:

oldwiring · 24 June 2006 at 8:24AM

Cardew wrote:

Most properties are connected to a public sewer for sewerage, including water from taps etc.

However we are talking about surface drainage water here. e.g. water from gutters and rain falling on garden and paths etc.

In the last(??) years I believe building regulations have made it mandatory for surface drainage water to go the soakaways(unless there were special circumstances) and thus many modern homes would be entitled to the rebate.

My house is on a bank and the drive way slopes down to the road, and we have a terraced front garden with a wall that contains weep-holes. Couldn't the co claim that that water was going in to the sewers?

Get a rebate on your sewerage rates charges

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