Screwed by water company - help!

[MostlyFoggyTheseDays]

Hi everyone – looking for advice if anyone has fought a water company on damage to their house.

During the night in early Aug our taps and shower were forced on and flooded the bathroom. They were not on when we went to bed. We woke to a collapsed ceiling destroyed carpets, sofa, plaster etc. Emergency plumber called but they could not get to us as Severn Trent had closed all the roads around us. Bottom line plumber etc assess this was an over pressure/water hammer event caused by their works.

Rang ST first thing to report and ask for help. Also notified them that I was in chemo and had no immune system so exposure to damp and dirt on an ongoing basis was serious. None of their protocols kicked in and over a month later they have just said they are not provably liable. They have provided us with none of the data we asked for which may go to proof and are in breech of statutory requirements here.

House insurance won’t pay as they say it is a third party issue. We have legal cover with house insurance and are exploring this.

It was ST but we cannot prove it without their data which in turn may be flawed. Has anyone managed to go the distance with a water company and win? I am not at my strongest so the nature and length of any fight is a factor.

They have done a ‘soft close’ and we will ask again for the deadlock letter which they didn’t previously respond to. We have stopped pushing them so will now go back to that, thanks.

Given this path is trodden I think we’ll go to ombudsmen in parallel

Will do both and cover bases. We’ll draft the letter at the weekend then send it to the four winds

We will keep going. Thanks for the feedback and I have to say this thread has given me a boost to keep going.

we are going to start the work paying out of pocket as it’s now 6 weeks post flood and we can’t live like this anymore. It will all take longer though as we will have to do it bit by bit vs all at once if we had funding

Thanks - really helpful to have a start point. I will download twitter but not sure anyone would take any notice of an unknown poster? Or will the # do the trick?

There was an outage and burst main. But there was obviously more to it as it all happened during the night and the following afternoon there was a ST guy outside our house accessing a point there and he was super stressed and said they had no idea what was going on.

so wish I’d noted his van number etc but we were in chaos at the time. I did ask him to come in and see the damage but he wouldn’t

How about letting local television and local newspapers know as the water companies hate bad publicity and your insurance company might then say they will pay up.

Wow, this appalling! I think concentrating on insurance company is the way to go - how on earth are they arguing this isn’t covered by Escape of water under your policy, it’s irrelevant that it was caused by ST. Have you started the Formal Complaint process yet? I think you have to go through that, as they get a time period to respond, before FOS will take it up.

I second this. They are treating you appallingly.
Publicly shame them.

You try writing to The Good Law Project for advice?
They are currently investigating the water companies.
https://goodlawproject.org/?utm_source=Google&utm_campaign=DynamicAds&utm_medium=cpc&gad_source=1&gad_campaignid=23574209165&gbraid=0AAAAA9XRxgqpls7ZlOs1xeJNsTGIUf-c9&gclid=Cj0KCQjwlNPVBhCMARIsAPZ5RqiEnBoeAmlZNGhDOhFt5jIh2IZOu66NhRX4W9UcWTPenDwRhF8ZzOsaApvZEALw_wcB

the hashtags and @ tagging them will help. I got Amazon to move on a massive refund by tweeting non stop for weeks @

Hi we did complain, and got the below back. I think they should be doing the chasing and get costs back from ST, but their position is that we have to give them the evidence and they’ll think about it. Don’t use Trinity Claims! This is there ‘silver’ package too so we didn’t cheap out. From their letter:

I’ve had the battle with the water company that you are having. Have you told them you have legal cover and that your insurance company will cover the cost? When I did that they changed their attitude completely because they knew they were at fault and if it had gone to court they would have lost.

Hi the guardian, telegraph, daily mail. And the BBC radio 4 programme you and yours are great at investigating and helping people. You will need to provide them lots of evidence, time lines etc. it would be free. Not the daily mail sad face but they can do investigations etc.

Did you provide the plumber's report to the insurance company to prove some sort of mechanical failure due to the abnormal pressure?

From the response from the insurance company you've attached, it sounds like there was no evidence provided to show that it was a visible mechanical failure (regardless of cause), so their assumption is that it was accidental damage (tap left on) which you would only be covered for if you had Accidental Damage Cover.

I had a very lengthy complaints process with Thames Water over a leak. I made a subject access request to get a load of data that the complaints team said didn’t exist. I did get some money out of them but I’m now going through the ombudsman as I don’t think I was fairly compensated. I had to completely exhaust the complaints process with TW first until they said “this is our final communication on the matter” and directed me to the ombudsman. Ombudsman wouldn’t take the case until TW confirmed they’d exhausted everything on their end. Still waiting for the case to be investigated by the ombudsman, it’s been with them over 3 months. This is their website: www.ccw.org.uk

We have started this and await the feedback from the legal pers as they will only take the case forward under insurance if there is a greater than 51% chance we will win.

Hopefully they will decide in our favour and I will defo take your advice at that point and let STW know - thank you

Good luck - but god this depressing, the time, energy and tenacity you need must mean they get away with murder

I’ll get on this, this weekend. They deserve to be properly examined and publicly held to account

Seven trent have their own Facebook group of people complaining about there piss poor expensive service

The water companies are literally getting away with murder - the documentary “Dirty Business” on earlier this year shows the scale of corruption. They really do need to give you the information you’ve asked for.

Have you tried calling the citizens advice bureau? I’ve found them to be really helpful when I was at a dead end with a complaint before and didn’t know where to turn.