I have a 'Smart' meter on my water supply. I have a softener for thehouse supply that regenerates based on the amount of water used. Theonly unsoftened outlets are the kitchen drinking water cold tap, andthe outdoor tap, both of which come from the same pipe.Recently, in the last month, the softener's salt consumption hasgone up, considerably. I looked at the water meter readings, and theyagree. But I cannot think of any change in my water use.The obvious thought is that there is a leak, but where? I can findabsolutely no sign of any. The outside tap does not leak, and is shutoff indoors anyway. None of the taps are dripping. None of theoverflows are showing any discharge. The drains for the washing machineand the dishwasher need power to run water to the drain. There is acellar in the middle of the house, where I would expect any water thatleaked out to gravitate to, but it is dry. The box where the outsidepipe enters the house is dry, so no leaks there, and the undergroundspace outside which houses the meter is similarly dry. There is no soundof running water in the softener box, which is right above the entrybox.The recorded meter readings give little help, they are sporadic andinterrupted enough that trying to correlate high water use with a knownevent in the house is very difficult indeed. But on a day when I did aclothes wash, and therefore used maybe 80-100 litres more than a'normal' day, the readings show that I had minimal use! The watercompany online query system says that it could take up to 10 days torespond to questions.As much as the reported readings are of little help, they do confirmthat the theoretical leak is of softened water, and all but 1 run ofthat is in the house, so would be discovered. Only one run, to thekitchen, is underground, in concrete. I hope that there is no leakthere, it would be messy to fix that. And how do I check?I am trying to think of experiments using selective shut-offs to try toisolate any leak, but the random meter...

On Tue, 8 Jul 2025 10:18:41 -0000 (UTC)Tweed wrote:Yes, but it is a bitch to see. I even had a passerby stop to help methe other day, and even with a 'smartmeter' photo, he still found itbetter to just read it, the same as me. I will read it tonight, andwork out what to do next.Moving this to the d-i-y NG, where it should have been in the firstplace.

On Wed, 9 Jul 2025 08:07:58 +0100, Jeff Layman wrote:Yes. ST did say 'don't do it again.'

On Wed, 09 Jul 2025 16:23:29 +0100Peter JohnsThat's what happened here. One leak is ok, shit happens, more and youare on your own. I got £80 refunded.

Where did my water go? (Moved from wrong NG)

Jul 08, 2025 Last reply: 11 months ago 24 Replies

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RJH 1 year ago

Where I'm staying at the moment, one toilet has the flush buttons the wrong way round, the other toilet both buttons do a full fill - with hot water.

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Chris Hogg 1 year ago

My mother had an almost identical problem, some fifteen years ago. Plastic pipe on a sharp stone in the pipeline between the meter (in the road) and the bungalow. Fortunately the water company (SWW) noticed a significant increase in her water use, contacted her and came and fixed it with no charge.

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Peter Johnson 1 year ago

The change must have something to do with reduced installation costs for builders/developers as well.

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Peter Johnson 1 year ago

Yes. ST did say 'don't do it again.'

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Davey 11 months ago

That's what happened here. One leak is ok, s*it happens, more and you are on your own. I got £80 refunded.

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