Utility connections to a self-build - costs.

Doozergirl

I've never had to deal with completely new connections involving distance before, usually just re-instating old ones. This might be a bit far out for this board, but if someone has a recommendation of another forum, that would be great. Googling isn't bringing me an awful lot of info and I'm surprised, as this is turning out to be complicated and it's also incredibly expensive.

Our prospective meter positions were presumed by us to be on the side of our new house. The house will be situated behind our existing house. I'm trying to get prices for the connections. Electric quote is £2,300 (44 metres) but my main issue today is gas.

The gas main is about 55 meters away, with perhaps only 3 or 4 metres on public land. Cadent told me that is over standard distance and I need to pay a non-refundable £3-600 for a quote from them only, or I go out to 'competition'. Filled out a competition form on Cadent website - one company replied to me and have just quoted me £4,500 to connect.

On the Cadent website, if the gas meter is less than 40 metres away, then the cost of connection seems to be a straight £690. I'm sure I saw on a forum someone had put their meter on their garage to cut down the distance. If we did this, the meter would be about 35 metres from the main and about 20 metres from the house. We do have the benefit of almost all of the distance being our own land.

Having spoken to our gas engineer, he says that he is perfectly able to run piping (to calculated specification) directly to the house from the meter and is on a job now where he is running to three houses. When I spoke to the people quoting he said it was do-able but that it would cost the same anyway.

I'm confused and really quite lost at this point. Do they think that they have to run the extra from the meter, and that our engineer can't do it?

I'm just looking for someone that might have done this before, maybe more than once! I'm concerned of over spending.

Kiran

It sounds very much like they are quoting for the whole lot in both instances. Stats companies are notorious for this type of thing.


As an example, on my current job we are installing a new HV transformer to supply a building at a cost of around £53k, A temporary supply for my site was quoted at £51k. I've also had similar issues on domestic projects with the gas shipper. There is no reason that your gas engineer (who is presumable qualified given that he is doing the job elsewhere) can not run your pipework. I frequently use 3rd party companies to run pipework from the meter on commercial builds.


Cadnet seem to be confused, I'm assuming they didn't come to site to requote etc. It would seem that someone has misunderstood, it would probably be worth asking them to requite a single supply just to the garage rather than showing the whole run into the house. The other potential saving would be to get the excavation done by your own contractor on behalf of the shipper however I have had varying levels of success doing this.


I don't think I've told you anything you don't already know already but hopefully you can get it requoted based on the above scenarios and get the price down.

Doozergirl

That's really reassuring, actually, thank you. I've been really questioning myself.

Electricity have been out to site. I am going to ask them to break down their quote as it's essentially for the connections and the cable; I will pay my guys to do all the excavations and provide the ducting and meter. The surveyor estimated the cost at £1,000 and it came in at £2,300. I have asked the company that quoted for gas to quote this too, but I'm not confident with them. Their first gas quote was nearly £9,000 - they'd already misinterpreted something.

I'm going to go back to Cadent re: Gas with the position of the garage. Hopefully then they will come out and we can get that tied up at a more reasonable cost.

Alex1983

When I had a gas supply put in the owner offer to dig the trench and they said it wouldn't make any difference as they were using a mole.

Doozergirl

Interesting. How far was it and how much did you pay?

I've heard of this mole but everyone so far expects us to dig.

Alex1983

It was a few years back in the south west and was approx 10-15m and fit a meter box to wall and then i did the pipework on the outlet side and I think it was about £1200ish.

Kiran

I would definitely insist on the site visit and hopefully you'll get the full attention of the surveyor rather than someone doing a drawing take off (badly).


Trenching on the shippers behalf has varying results but given the distances involved in this case there should be a reasonable saving.


Using a mole or pipe jacking is quite expensive and a bit specialist in s much as its not a piece of kit available to your average ground worker/builder. If you haven't got finished surfaces down then an excavator is the way to go

Furts

The problem with a mole is if services get hit, or obstructions are encountered. OK in a streetworks situation when road closure and pedestrian safety get factored in. But here surveying for existing services is meticulous and one knows there are not likely to be any obstructions - old rock, concrete rubble or whatever.

Open dig is always the default answer. Locate services, hand dig where necessary to find them and explore unknown areas but if this is not practical consider a plan B - like a mole.