Drain Covers - who's responsible?

[Fred Finisterre]

These sort of things

(the one on the left). There are 3 or 4 around my property (on my land). They're pretty rusted and rotten. I don't mind replacing them myself if it's down to me, but they don't seem very easy to get hold of.

So it occurred to me that maybe they're provided by the council or the water company? Could this be? Would they be free or chargeable?

Any ideas? The property is under Basildon (Essex) District Council and Anglian / Essex & Suffolk water.

Cheers,

Fred.

[Andrew Gabriel]

You can get them from a good builder's merchant. If you are replacing them, I would avoid the pressed steel covers -- they tend to go ping-pong when you step on them, and the light duty cast iron ones are not much more expensive. You generally have to replace the frame and cover together.

As to whose property they are, it depends on which services they are providing access to, and in some cases, the age of the property and if the services are solely for that property or if they are shared at that point.

[Weatherlawyer]

Left them with a boulster chisel or a pry bar and have a look what services they are designed to inspect. Then post the info on here and cross post to uk.legal (so we can follow at a distance.)

If you find that the covers are lying proud of their surroundings, a common occurence with settlement, you can knock a layer of bricks off prior to the replacement by whoever. On a fairly new house one set in a lawn tends to end up exactly 1 course too high. I would set them just below level to allow mowers to pass over them.

[Roger Mills]

It depends what's under them! If it's a public sewer, it's down to the water authority. If it's a private sewer serving only your property, it's down to you. If it's a private sewer serving several properties, the owners of the properties so served share the responsibility for maintaining it - presumably including the covers. Getting them to stump up could be interesting, though!