Water pipes

Ladydismay40

Hello, please, can I have some advice/Education? Today, we received a phone call from Seven Trent saying there was a leak detected across a few houses including ours from a shared pipe, and we need to speak to our home insurance about leak detection. We have done this and are waiting for them to come round. However, our house is old, so I would think the pipes are too and the insurance doesn't cover wear and tear. What happens if the leak is on my boundary but the insurance won't pay to fix it? We have no savings; our money pays for all the bills. I am sick with worry and just don’t know what to do.

MyRealNameToo

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6670020/water-pipes

Generally insurance covers only things that happen from an insured peril like accidental damage or impact. In addition most insurers also cover escape of water irrespective of the cause so will cover resultant damage if a pipe burst but not the actual pipe itself. Better policies also cover trace and access but most require there to be resultant damage for this clause to take effect.

The location of the leak and if its a shared or individual property supply is going to be critical to identify who's problem it is or if its shared across multiple parties.

Gonk1967

Have a look at your insurance documents and see if you are covered for buried cables and pipes. We had the same issue recently (our house was built in 1976) and the insurance covered the repairs… not that they did a good job as we still seem to have a leak 😐️

elsien

unfortunately Severn Trent no longer offer the one free repair that they used to do in these circumstances.
If you can’t afford to pay, then contact the customer support leakage team on 0345 2660036 to see if there are any other options that they can offer.
definitely doublecheck with your insurance first.

The problem is, if it’s a shared water pipe is coordinating with all the other households. Happened to me on a pipe shared privately between five houses and although there were cheaper companies out there then Severn Trent coordinating payment between them all was just too complicated - absentee landlords et cetera.

I just got lucky because one branch of Severn Trent didn’t know what the others were doing so they came and fixed it anyway free of charge.