Neighbour wants to cut-off our water supply!!! -Advice Needed

ibz75

We live in a victorian (c.1900) end terraced property. Our neighbour is currently building a kitchen extension to the back of their property.

They informed me today that they had encountered a problem in the cellar - a mains water pipe which runs through their entire inner wall (from their neighbours) and into our cellar. This is our main supply pipe which also has the emergency stop-tap. The pipe runs about halfway from the floor to the ceiling.

They are wanting to knock through the cellar wall into their new extension but the pipe is in the way. They want to remove the pipe and have advised us that we should install our own pipe from our property directly to the supply pipe in the street!!!

I understand that this pipe runs through their property (inside) but surely they can't decide to cut-off our water supply???

Do they need permission from the water authority to do this?

Their suggestion that we install our own supply pipe would surely be expensive and would require permission - plus, why would we have to pay for this!

I have suggested that they re-route the pipe around the walls and ceilings of the cellar - but not sure if this would be viable.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks

pleasedelete

Get the water board to come out. During building we discovered a single pipe fed 6 houses which was why no one could install showers.

Water board ran new supply up to everyones house for free. I think the charging was discretionary but they coukd do it for free in certain circumstances and that's what they recorded. Thin blue pipes- needed small channel in lawn and then somewhere to come in. The new supply was brilliant- fabulous pressure.

No they can't do it. We had the liability to restore and maintain the supply although no one knew it was in our garden until builders went through the pipe! We had temporary blue pipes everywhere for a few weeks.

We were end terrace of 4 but also pipe fed 2 other houses and it was about 5cms wide and totally furred up.

diable

They should get the water board in to re route the pipe as I believe they are not entitled to deprive you of water.

Hintza

Check your deeds you may have a right of servitude.

1jim

I wouldnt have thought they could "make " you do anything
You currently have a working water supply
They are building an extension
They dont want the liability of the water supply but presumably the water board approved this supply in the begining
If any alterations need to be made surely they should foot the bill as it is at their choice.

Do they know they may share drains as well?

ceridwen

The moral standpoint here - which I guess you might have realised - is that it is the norm for peeps to have their waterpipe coming straight in from outside (underneath the communal territory of pavement). People cant realistically expect to run their waterpipes through someone else's house.

I dont suppose you knew for one minute that this was the case - and had probably assumed your water piping WAS only coming through "communal" territory and not someone else's house.

It is very unfortunate for you that this has proven to be the case and I would be upset in your position to find that some damn fool workman some decades ago had put my house in this position and put me at risk of having to spend money to put it right.

But - that is the way this situation should be handled - ie you get the Water Board to re-route your water pipe the way it should have gone in the first place (ie NOT involving someone else's house) and hope that they won't charge you for it or that maybe your insurance company might pay for it.

So - I sympathise with the unexpected bill you might be about to get - but realistically its not possible to expect someone else to have a neighbours water pipe running round the walls of THEIR cellar. Look at it from your neighbours viewpoint - you've probably upset them already with making that suggestion to them and they will now be scared that you might "create trouble" for them because of a problem that is ultimately yours and nothing to do with them. In their position - then I wouldnt have expected for one minute to encounter anything to do with a neighbours house when I started doing work on my own house.

So - you really do need to "do the right thing" here - accept that this work has to be done. However - the good news is that I think there is a good chance that the "damn fool workman" involved was some long-gone Water Board employee and that therefore the Water Board will be the ones who will have to cover the cost involved to put right this poor workmanship.

Look at it this way - they could have just gone ahead and removed this odd bit of pipe on their territory that served no purpose to them and you would have just wondered what had happened to your water supply. They have had the decency to tell you in advance that your water supply will be affected and you will now have to "make other arrangements" - ie get that workmanship put right. By telling you in advance they have saved you endless trouble wondering why your water supply no longer works.

mikey72

It's quite common for older houses to have a common water pipe.
Normally it was run from the communal stand pipe in the yard to provide water for a tap in the kitchen, so it was just run through all the properties, as you said, their's comes in from next door.
Nobody has a right just to dis-connect it.
It they had, they would have been obliged to re-instate it.
Contact the water board.

keystone

ceridwen wrote: »

The moral standpoint here - which I guess you might have realised - is that it is the norm for peeps to have their waterpipe coming straight in from outside (underneath the communal territory of pavement). People cant realistically expect to run their waterpipes through someone else's house....................they have saved you endless trouble wondering why your water supply no longer works.

What are you on?

Cheers

keystone

mikey72 wrote: »

It's quite common for older houses to have a common water pipe.
Normally it was run from the communal stand pipe in the yard to provide water for a tap in the kitchen, so it was just run through all the properties, as you said, their's comes in from next door.
Nobody has a right just to dis-connect it.
It they had, they would have been obliged to re-instate it.
Contact the water board.

Spot on in every respect.

Cheers

vax2002

You or anyone else can only work on your water supply from the stop tap upwards, anything else is the responsibility of the Water Board and interfering with the Water network is an offence.
But another point You did say knock through a cellar wall didnt you ? on a terraced house.. or am I seeing things ?
Who is doing this for them ? I trust they have a structural report and method statement they can show you plus insurance to cover your property in the event of a structural failure.
A quick call to the council building inspector would be my first call, he will also put them straight on the water pipe.

relic

ceridwen wrote: »

The moral standpoint here - which I guess you might have realised - is that it is the norm for peeps to have their waterpipe coming straight in from outside (underneath the communal territory of pavement). People cant realistically expect to run their waterpipes through someone else's house.

I dont suppose you knew for one minute that this was the case - and had probably assumed your water piping WAS only coming through "communal" territory and not someone else's house.

It is very unfortunate for you that this has proven to be the case and I would be upset in your position to find that some damn fool workman some decades ago had put my house in this position and put me at risk of having to spend money to put it right.

But - that is the way this situation should be handled - ie you get the Water Board to re-route your water pipe the way it should have gone in the first place (ie NOT involving someone else's house) and hope that they won't charge you for it or that maybe your insurance company might pay for it.

So - I sympathise with the unexpected bill you might be about to get - but realistically its not possible to expect someone else to have a neighbours water pipe running round the walls of THEIR cellar. Look at it from your neighbours viewpoint - you've probably upset them already with making that suggestion to them and they will now be scared that you might "create trouble" for them because of a problem that is ultimately yours and nothing to do with them. In their position - then I wouldnt have expected for one minute to encounter anything to do with a neighbours house when I started doing work on my own house.

So - you really do need to "do the right thing" here - accept that this work has to be done. However - the good news is that I think there is a good chance that the "damn fool workman" involved was some long-gone Water Board employee and that therefore the Water Board will be the ones who will have to cover the cost involved to put right this poor workmanship.

Look at it this way - they could have just gone ahead and removed this odd bit of pipe on their territory that served no purpose to them and you would have just wondered what had happened to your water supply. They have had the decency to tell you in advance that your water supply will be affected and you will now have to "make other arrangements" - ie get that workmanship put right. By telling you in advance they have saved you endless trouble wondering why your water supply no longer works.

I'd hope he was long gone, since as the OP indicated this is a Victorian era household. It was also common place that this sort of thing happened in those years.

As for your last paragraph, it is completely wrong.

A lot of text, for very little content, and totally incorrect advice!