Evening all, called to a doozy today, bit of a ramble but any thoughts appreciated
called to a ladies house today that it have done several jobs for over the last 12 months. She has just received her water Bill and she says it has more than quadrupled.
Prior to calling me she had the water company out to try and explain this massive difference between bills. She is a widower and her usage habits have not changed as proved by her previous half a dozen bills which within a tenner or so are identical. Everything points to a leak.
The water co came out and traced this leak back to a bathroom toilet that was constantly letting by at the dump valve. Worn and scaled washer.
Obviously the the lady is most upset at having to fork out nigh on a grand for water, however I am wondering if she has any recourse here.
The facts are:
i went to change ladies stopcock, which had ceased, very early last year. I was unable to complete this as the border stop cocks hole in the street had completely caved in. I contacted the water co and they were out the next day to clear this so that meter and stopcock could be accessed.
When water co made their recent visit to search for the leak they obviously started at the border stopcock for let by and the engineer told the lady that her meter should've been updated 6 years ago. This leads me to believe that this hole could have been caved in for anything up to the last 6 years when they may have decided it was too much effort to change the meter owing to the cave in. By this logic is it conceivable that the water co have been estimating her usage for all this time?
i was of the impression that water companies have a duty to monitor excessive usage as I've seen a couple of examples of this with a couple of my letting agent properties where they have received letters notifying the tenant of excessive use and suggesting that they may have a problem.
Basically im just trying to ascertain if my lady has a leg to stand on here to argue the toss that the likelihood is that the water co haven't read her meter in years owing to the cave in?
would this seem reasonable.
Many thanks if you're still reading.
Matt
called to a ladies house today that it have done several jobs for over the last 12 months. She has just received her water Bill and she says it has more than quadrupled.
Prior to calling me she had the water company out to try and explain this massive difference between bills. She is a widower and her usage habits have not changed as proved by her previous half a dozen bills which within a tenner or so are identical. Everything points to a leak.
The water co came out and traced this leak back to a bathroom toilet that was constantly letting by at the dump valve. Worn and scaled washer.
Obviously the the lady is most upset at having to fork out nigh on a grand for water, however I am wondering if she has any recourse here.
The facts are:
i went to change ladies stopcock, which had ceased, very early last year. I was unable to complete this as the border stop cocks hole in the street had completely caved in. I contacted the water co and they were out the next day to clear this so that meter and stopcock could be accessed.
When water co made their recent visit to search for the leak they obviously started at the border stopcock for let by and the engineer told the lady that her meter should've been updated 6 years ago. This leads me to believe that this hole could have been caved in for anything up to the last 6 years when they may have decided it was too much effort to change the meter owing to the cave in. By this logic is it conceivable that the water co have been estimating her usage for all this time?
i was of the impression that water companies have a duty to monitor excessive usage as I've seen a couple of examples of this with a couple of my letting agent properties where they have received letters notifying the tenant of excessive use and suggesting that they may have a problem.
Basically im just trying to ascertain if my lady has a leg to stand on here to argue the toss that the likelihood is that the water co haven't read her meter in years owing to the cave in?
would this seem reasonable.
Many thanks if you're still reading.
Matt
