Not on mains water selling problem

ian1246

Being supplied via a borehole is fairly normal tbh. The village I live in with several 1000 occupants across 100's of houses is supplied by Welsh Water from a giant bore hole. I do pay for water & sewage though!

GDB2222

Grumpy_chap said:

Mundfords said:

My cottage is over 130 years old. Bought as many properties from ministry of defence over 25years ago 3 previous owners before me. I had a mortgage to buy & no issues. I have come to sell & there solicitors have advised then not to buy as its services by seven Trent services bore hole on mod land. None of us ever pay water & never have. 

I have a contract with mod agreeing to supply water but the risk apparently is for the buyer that mod could turn the supply off as I’m 3 miles from Anglian water to connect they told me my house is not sellable ? Why is it happening now no issues came up when I bought or my 2 neighbours. Any help advice would be appreciated?

The MoD operate "inset" water companies across a large proportion of their estate.  In the main, the MoD outsource the management and operation of these "inset" companies to external providers, such as Severn Trent Services, as operating utility services is not the expertise of the MoD.  Some areas, power services are on a similar basis.

The "inset" water companies have the same rights, obligations, regulations and responsibilities as the statutory water providers in terms of water supply (but less power in terms of land access).  The "inset" water companies cannot simply turn off the water supply or cease to operate the borehole, treatment, and distribution of the service.

Are you providing the correct information about utility supply when returning the property information form?

If the OP has never paid for water, is there a risk that the water company suddenly notices and levies backdated charges? If so, would those charges fall on the buyer? I assume that the water company could go back at least 6 years.

Mundfords

Sorry what water account number. I don’t pay for water! 

EssexHebridean

Ah. Now assuming that they aren’t paying for water/sewage and the supply Co for the area is as a result not aware of them, this would possibly explain the issue the buyers encountered as I suspect it might have glitched the CON29DW when their solicitor submitted it. 

Op - if there is a legit in reason why you don’t get charged, getting in writing what that reason is, and how that right is protected might be a “belt and braces” approach, however ask your solicitor first in case doing so could create further problems. 

I now don’t think the borehole supply is the issue though, I think the no charges thing is! 

Grumpy_chap

GDB2222 said:

If the OP has never paid for water, is there a risk that the water company suddenly notices and levies backdated charges? If so, would those charges fall on the buyer? I assume that the water company could go back at least 6 years.

I understand we are talking about MoD estate (not all of which is garrisoned) and the inset water company operator - Severn Trent, Veolia or such like - will have been paid by MoD to operate the water infrastructure and network.  If that is the case, then the water company would not be able to back-bill the individual property owners.  

What may well happen is that the agreement for the inset water company operator will come up for renewal and future water charges may be introduced on a similar basis to paying a statutory undertaker (regional water company).  

Whether the MoD could (and would) ever seek to back-bill the property owners is something I am unsure on but I suspect that MoD would not seek to recover past costs.

The other change would be for the MoD to "alienate" (sell) the land as a job lot(*), transferring to a developer who then develops appropriate undeveloped areas.  In this process, the developer would normally arrange for the utility infrastructure to be adopted by the regional operators instead of continuing on the inset arrangement.  This would result in the OP simply paying for water and sewage in the same way as the majority of the population do.

(*) - that would be the sale of the land that remains MoD Estate so common areas, not individual properties that have already been divested.

Mundfords

I have an agreement from the mod in place & was told by them no one usually has a problem with this when selling but they said seven Trent will be in contact & bill me for water. But they never gave should I just bite the bullet & get them to start charging me? Just to make it easier to then sell. All 4 cottages around me don’t pay for water. Mod guy said most people don’t complain just enjoy the free water! Any suggestions?

MysteryMe

If the MOD told you Severn Trent would be contacting you regarding billing for services then that suggests you should have been paying something and you knew that. Despite what "MOD guy" says, it wasn't free water, it was water and waste you were erroneously not being charged for. As the error is not yours hopefully they wont be billing for historical usage.

Things are different now to 25 years ago, buyers/lenders/solicitors are much more risk adverse, so I do think you need to get this sorted.

Grumpy_chap

Mundfords said:

I have an agreement from the mod in place & was told by them no one usually has a problem with this when selling but they said seven Trent will be in contact & bill me for water. But they never gave should I just bite the bullet & get them to start charging me? Just to make it easier to then sell. All 4 cottages around me don’t pay for water. Mod guy said most people don’t complain just enjoy the free water! Any suggestions?

What is the content of the agreement from the MoD?
If that agreement includes a premise that Severn Trent will contact you about payment for water and waste water, then you should have expected the bill to arrive or followed that up if no bill arrived in a reasonable period.
Mostly, the inset water company will bill householders on a similar basis to the normal local water companies.

EssexHebridean

Ahh - this is a #Awkward situation then - and you should probably pre warn your neighbours that their tenure with free water will almost certainly shortly be about to come to an end… as said, you are going to need to get this sorted before selling unless you can find a buyer who is willing to take a chance on it (solicitors are all going to advise against that course of action, be warned!) so I don’t think you have any choice but to bite the bullet and get things sorted! 

Mundfords

Thank you all, best advice ever. I have contacted seven Trent & chased them up for a bill. I hope the neighbours will still talk to me. Do you think it’s worth contacting a solicitors to ask them to go through the mod contract as well before I sell again ?