Who's responsible for external water pipes ?

[John Anderton]

Having found out today that the water pipe doesn't run where I've always been told it does by the simple expedient of putting a spade through it, I'm just pondering the possible repair scenarios.

I know that, normally, the water company is responsible for the supply up to the mains stopcock in the street and the householder thereafter but my situation is a little unusual since I have a supply put in by the local estate for their tenants about 30 years ago which doesn't follow the usual rules.

ASCII art follows :

House Next door |_________________||________________| | | | | | | Stopcocks & ---> | |---------/ Water meters | | | | Additional -----> | | stopcock | -----\ | | | Boundary ---> ---------------------- | | Mains --> -------------------------------

The supply pipe comes out of my house to a stopcock and water meter, as does my neighbours, then the supply which feeds both runs through my garden to another stopcock and then turns abruptly (which is what caught me out and where I damaged the pipe) before going under the fence and, presumably, running down through my neighbour's garden to the mains where there is no stopcock.

Th leak has been temporarily fixed by someone from the water supply company but they don't maintain the pipes.

I'm going to talk to the person in charge of the estate supply tomorrow but I wondered whether I am allowed to repair the damaged pipe myself or whether the supplier has to (I'd prefer it if they did but if they start quoting hundreds of pounds I'd like something to bargain with) ?

Cheers,

John

[Brian G]

John,

Generally, whatever the direction of the pipe, if the damage is inside your boundary - you are responsible (especially if you caused it). If it is a 'shared' pipe between two or more houses, then obviously the cost of repairs are shared (unless you or a neighbour caused the damage).

The only chance that you may have is if the pipe has not been buried to the correct depth in the ground (to whatever the regulations said 30 years ago [normally around 2 - 3 feet]) then you could possibly use this a lever for someone else to pay for the repair.

Brian G

[John Anderton]

Thanks for the reply but I'm not expecting anybody else to pay for the repairs, what I'd like to know is whether I am allowed to repair the pipe myself as that would give me something to bargain with if the estate want to charge me an arm and a leg to do the repair themselves

Cheers,

John

[Brian G]

John,

Yes providing you own your property, you can do the repair yourself (providing the repair complies with whatever waterboard regulations are in force in your area).

If you don't own the property, then it should still be possible for you to carry out the repairs but you will have to get the owners permission to do so.

As a matter of interest, subject to damage being 'clean' and the pipe is of copper or plastic, then the repair should simple and the cost *shouldn't* be high (a different matter if it's lead or iron).

As a rider, if it is a leased or rented property, and you have damaged the pipe by simply digging the garden, then that pipe is too near the surface - so use this as lever and get the landlord to either repair it or better still, renew it to the correct depth at his cost - saves you cash and a backache through digging.

Brian G

[John Anderton]

Ta. I do own the property, the damage is reasonably clean, the pipe is plastic and was two feet down (I was digging footings for a wall) so hopefully tomorrow's conversation will end up with the estate repairing the pipe to their satisfaction without draining my pocket too much,

Cheers,

John

[The Natural Philosopher]

Frankly mate if its downstream of a stopcock you can reach, to turn it all off, get a compression fitting and dig down where you buggered it, cut it cleanly and put a compression fitting on it and fill it up with gravel. You'll need to open it up a bit to get leverage to put the fitting on. but its only spade work.

Its got to be cheaper than arguing about who pays.

[Lobster]

I'd agree in general - once the pipe is on his property it's his responsibility, and he can repair it just the same as if it was a pipe inside his house. However the only difference here is that the pipe concerned also feeds his neighbour's property, ie, the OP would be working on pipework upstream of his neighbour. Might that not make a difference?

David

[John Anderton]

Herein lies the problem, it's not. It's upsteam from both the stopcocks in my garden and no-one knows where the next one is, it could be at the reservoir :-(

Oh, I'm not arguing about that, I know it'll be me if I don't DIY. I'd just like to know if there's an alternative, which there seems to be, to the estate charging me an arm and a leg,

Cheers,

John

[Stuart]

And unless the estate read this newsgroup who is to be any the wiser ,....LOL

[cynic]

Aside from the depth and routing considerations all you need to repair a cleanly cut plastic pipe is a coupler. However as its an old plastic pipe you will no doubt need imperial to metric adapters. At worst you may need two couplers and a section of new pipe to go between the old ends and if so you could dig out under your property to deepen the pipe out of harms way and run a new section while you are about it

[Ed Sirett]

In what way do the 'estate' have an interest in this pipe? Are you a leaseholder in some way? AIUI the pipe is the freeholder's who might or might not be the same as one of the leaseholder's.

Make sure you flush the pipe out well at the sink or garden tap, you don't want any %$^& getting stuck in the float valves or washing machine inlet valves.

[John Anderton]

That's what my original post was intended to find out (outside the fact that they provide the water supply, as mentioned earlier).

No

Cheers,

John

[Ed Sirett]

IANAL but this looks like it might be a legal minefield and the sooner it's mended the less trouble for all concerned.

I doubt very much that the supply company can insist on fixing it on your land, even if it does happen to be supplying 3rd parties. The estate could I suppose put some pressure you to fix it or get it fixed as you have 'interfered' with their supply.

[John Anderton]

Agreed. It would be far better if each house had it's own supply coming off separate stopcocks on the mains then I would have only interrupted my supply and would have been far happier about a DIY solution.

One of the estate bods fixed it today. Just as well it was him, the only stopcock he could find isolated the whole village :-)

Cheers,

John