Advice about responsibility for water leak repair.

NigelIR

Hello,

I have been asked by an elderly friend about an issue on their property and as I was not completely sure of what should happen I decided to ask for advice here.

They live in a semi-detached house, just them and their neighbour surrounded by fields. They noticed a damp patch on their lawn and as it was getting worse asked me to have a look. I had the water tested and it contains chlorine so is mains water but the leak is about 15 metres past their house and uphill from it. 

There is a single water supply pipe to the two houses it feeds the first on before carrying on to the next.

On looking around there is a galvanised cattle trough and a standing tap in the field just the other side of the hedge.

So it looks like the water supply pipe carries on after the houses and feed this trough.

I have drawn a picture to show this a bit clearer!

My understanding of the rules regarding a shared water supply pipe to three properties is: From the property boundary to the first property everyone shares responsibility, after the first property the responsibility is just shared between the next two and after the second all the responsibility belongs to the third property.

The problem is that we cannot find out who owns the field to tell them of the leak. So should we just inform our local water company and leave it to them to sort out? My main concern is that they will just tell my friend that they need to repair it or turn up repair it and charge them for the work.

Thanks!

ThisIsWeird

I presume no-one is being charged for this water loss?! Are there any meters fitted?
As you surmise, it shouldn't be the responsibility of your friend or their semi-neighbour, but only the farmer.
I think I'd do a couple of things - put a notice up on the trough or the field gate for the owner to hopefully see, and also inform the WB.

NigelIR

ThisIsWeird said:

I presume no-one is being charged for this water loss?! Are there any meters fitted?
As you surmise, it shouldn't be the responsibility of your friend or their semi-neighbour, but only the farmer.
I think I'd do a couple of things - put a notice up on the trough or the field gate for the owner to hopefully see, and also inform the WB.

Fortunately they are not metered!
Good idea about the sign, I’ll get them to put up one.

By WB do you mean the water supplier? My worry about that is they will just call in a repairer and give the bill to my friend.

Section62

NigelIR said:

ThisIsWeird said:

I presume no-one is being charged for this water loss?! Are there any meters fitted?
As you surmise, it shouldn't be the responsibility of your friend or their semi-neighbour, but only the farmer.
I think I'd do a couple of things - put a notice up on the trough or the field gate for the owner to hopefully see, and also inform the WB.

Fortunately they are not metered!
Good idea about the sign, I’ll get them to put up one.

By WB do you mean the water supplier? My worry about that is they will just call in a repairer and give the bill to my friend.

I would hold off contacting the water company until you've been able to speak the to owner of the water trough.  If it has an unmetered supply the water company may take a dim view of this if they find out.  The trough owner might be willing to expedite repairs to the pipe on the basis the water company need never know anything about it.... avoiding the possibility of discovering the deeds of the two houses make them responsible paying (part of) the cost of the repair up to the boundary with the field.

All of which of course assumes the trough is being fed with mains water along the route which includes the damp patch....

ThisIsWeird

NigelIR said:

ThisIsWeird said:

I presume no-one is being charged for this water loss?! Are there any meters fitted?
As you surmise, it shouldn't be the responsibility of your friend or their semi-neighbour, but only the farmer.
I think I'd do a couple of things - put a notice up on the trough or the field gate for the owner to hopefully see, and also inform the WB.

Fortunately they are not metered!
Good idea about the sign, I’ll get them to put up one.

By WB do you mean the water supplier? My worry about that is they will just call in a repairer and give the bill to my friend.

Yes, I meant Water Board.

No, your friend is almost certainly not responsible for this, or liable in any way (unless it heads to a field or garden tap of theirs!)

Good point by S62 - best see if you can inform the owner of the trough first.

Can you get to this trough quite easily? Can you activate the ball valve to see if it's receiving water? If so, then it should be possible to test whether it's on the same 'line' as your supply by turning off that stopcock.

Is there only one external SC for both your houses? If so, good chance your water will need to be turned off whilst repairs are carried out.

35har1old

ThisIsWeird said:

NigelIR said:

ThisIsWeird said:

I presume no-one is being charged for this water loss?! Are there any meters fitted?
As you surmise, it shouldn't be the responsibility of your friend or their semi-neighbour, but only the farmer.
I think I'd do a couple of things - put a notice up on the trough or the field gate for the owner to hopefully see, and also inform the WB.

Fortunately they are not metered!
Good idea about the sign, I’ll get them to put up one.

By WB do you mean the water supplier? My worry about that is they will just call in a repairer and give the bill to my friend.

Yes, I meant Water Board.

No, your friend is almost certainly not responsible for this, or liable in any way (unless it heads to a field or garden tap of theirs!)

Good point by S62 - best see if you can inform the owner of the trough first.

Can you get to this trough quite easily? Can you activate the ball valve to see if it's receiving water? If so, then it should be possible to test whether it's on the same 'line' as your supply by turning off that stopcock.

Is there only one external SC for both your houses? If so, good chance your water will need to be turned off whilst repairs are carried out.

It could be that the stopcock for the trough is possibly buried  Where these semi's ever farm labour's cottages.If you are not happy turning the supply of you could arrange for the two semi's owners to agree a time when they are not drawing water and then listen with a rod for running water that would confirm that the pipe does supply the trough
 

NigelIR

Time for an update…
They arranged for a company to come and put in a stop tap on the line to the trough so they could stop the leak by just turning it off, so if/when farmer wanted to use the trough they could repair the pipe.

(Yes the houses were farm worker houses and the supply pipe is common to both houses and the trough.)

The next day, before the work started, the farmer was in the field spreading fertiliser and called on the house to say it looked like their cess tank was leaking! They took him up to the water pipe leak and explained what they were going to do and he said he still wants the supply (probably because not metered!) and will organise the repair of the pipe for the middle of the week.

That was two weeks ago and still not repaired and it is leaking badly now, running down the garden like a hose running full flow.

Should they tell the water supply company? Or just get the stop tap installed?

Section62

NigelIR said:

Should they tell the water supply company? Or just get the stop tap installed?

Sensible thing would be to speak to the farmer again and say this needs fixing ASAP otherwise it will need to be done by the water company.  Give him a deadline of (say) the middle of next week.

If the pipe is plastic (although the odds of that may not be good) there's no reason why he couldn't dig down to the pipe and then clamp it to stop the flow, without needing (for now) to cut into the pipe and fit a stop tap. So an emergency solution isn't necessarily something he will need a plumber for.

NigelIR

Hi all, sorry about the big gaps between replies. I have been told that they turned up last week and dug up the lawn and replaced part of the galvanised pipe with some blue plastic pipe and then filled in the hole. They left the lawn in a bit of a mess, chewed up and uneven, but at least the leak has stopped.