Water Meter - What if there is a leak?

AuntyJean

I am thinking of changing to a water meter and worked out that I will save about £50 per year if not more.

My concern though is if there is a leak between the service outside my garden and inside (ie I do not know about it).

Is there insurance to cover the involuntary 'usage'?

derrick

Check your household insurance,this is usually included

digital

I installed my own meter and placed it inside my house.

Maximum length of pipe is 'their's', minimum is 'mine'...

MarkyMarkD

My meter was installed by Severn Trent Water - and it's inside the house. So there isn't any external pipeage for me to lose metered water through.

System

Because we are due to have our boiler exchanged soon, they will have to drain the system. I rang Anglian water and asked if I could claim anything as I am on a meter. It seems they allow £2 for every one hour of water lost due to central heating drainage. I have to "time" this when it happens and let them know.

lisyloo

My concern though is if there is a leak between the service outside my garden and inside (ie I do not know about it).

It's pretty easy to check if you are concerned.

Just shut off all the taps etc in the house.
Go any look at the meter and see if it's spinning (there's a things that spins in ours).
If it's carries on spinning then you have a leak.

trisontana

I had a meter installed about 5 years ago. After a couple of months Anglia Water contacted me and said that , because of a high consumption rate they suspected that I might have a leak . After some investigation they found that the leak was in the driveway, between the meter and the house. So AW came along and, at their expense, dug the drive up, replaced a length of pipe and made good. The leak was in a joint just before the pipe entered the house. On top of that I received a cheque from AW of over a £100 to compensate for the over-charge because of the leak.

What I cannot understand is the fact that I always thought that the water company's responsibility ended at the meter. Perhaps they thought it was their fault for not checking before the meter was installed . So well done Anglia Water.

StephenB_2

As luck would have it, On the Level in yesterday's Sunday Telegraph (9/1/05) included a few lines on leaks in water pipes between the main and your house. Apparently, the Water Companies (... ys?) agreed with Prescott that, as part of a leak reduction drive, they would repair that section of pipe free.

As is the way of these things, my newspaper collection day is today, so my copy's gone: it's not online yet (https://www.telegraph.co.uk/jeff).

SJB

Robert5988

on Today at 8:48am, island_man wrote:Because we are due to have our boiler exchanged soon, they will have to drain the system. I rang Anglian water and asked if I could claim anything as I am on a meter. It seems they allow £2 for every one hour of water lost due to central heating drainage. I have to "time" this when it happens and let them know.



I can't see why they should refund anything in these circumstances ... or even what encouraged you to think they should.

You don't measure water in hours, so what's that all about?

And £2 is far more than the value of the water in your central heating system, surely

MMD <-- very confused

Well they haven't actually said that they will refund £2 have they?

I believe £2 an hour equates to the maximum a domestic pipe can supply. Therefore if the drained central heating system takes, say, 2 minutes to refill you could get a refund of 6.67 pence!!!

However I agree it does seem a bizarre question and equally baffling answer.

koru

It's pretty easy to check if you are concerned.

Just shut off all the taps etc in the house.
Go any look at the meter and see if it's spinning (there's a things that spins in ours).
If it's carries on spinning then you have a leak.

This would have to include any water tanks in your attic, presumably. Otherwise, they might be refilling.

Would this detect a slow leak? (eg, one drop every few seconds) I'm wondering if this would be like trying to see the hands of a clock moving - the only way is to wait a couple of minutes and see if the hands have moved.

lisyloo

I am not sure if it would detect very tiny leaks.
I am not sure you could rely on it for that.

My meter (which was installed recent) has something that spins round (it's not a dial).
It spins very fast, so I assume it would show a small amount of water but I don't know about a drop.