to think friends staying shouldn't have two twenty min showers a day

[suziepra]

If got some friends staying and they keep having 40 wish mins of showering a day. A part from anything this can't be great for their skin but this is costing 1.60 a day in water with the meter and 1.40 in electric per person. Should I say something? Staying with for a week

Marking place for when the strip washers come out... :o

I'd turn the boiler off and have their bags ready for them when they got out.

Wasteful.

They are GUESTS. The thought that a host would time showers, resent people using perfume, notice whether someone had the tap on or off while brushing teeth...

3 quid a day and you fume and resent them? Tell me it's a reverse. Please.

Guests don't invite themselves over.

I don't strip wash, but no one needs to run water over themselves for 40 minutes a day.

This thread makes me think of Aunt Val and Uncle Harvey from League of Gentlemen!

sounds a long time. probably 10 mins at most if washing hair. seems excessive.

also makes bathroom steamy

I take 10 mins in the shower if I'm washing my hair or shaving legs/armpits/bikini line, 15 mins if I'm washing hair & shaving & just 2-3 mins if I'm just getting clean. I also turn off the shower while I get soaped & then turn it on a again to rinse, to save water.

20mins twice a day is excessive.

mrspratchett that's £3/day per person, so that would be £42 for the week. Just for the showers, and then there's other costs such as extra food.
Perhaps you can disregard that sort of money, but a lot of people can't.

I would never limit a guest on the utilities they used in my home (though yours sound as though they are very much taking the piss with the petrol money, OP! Are they students or something?), but DP and I live in the south west, and we are extremely careful with our water. We're down to £25 per month for two of us, but we use loads of water-saving techniques. You're going to think we're nutters, but water is a precious resource!... As is money...

We run a dehumidifer (live near the sea/loads of rain, thus constant battle with damp). All the water collected in that is funneled into empty bottles to be used for the flowers/washing the car/ironing/etc. Also, since it's ionised, it's brilliant as a basic cleaning fluid.

Same with water from the tumble dryer tank.

When we run the shower, it takes a few moments to warm up. So we stick a bucket under the flow for that time until the water is heated. Bucket is kept in the bathroom to flush the loo with! (Obviously only for the two of us, wouldn't dream of making a guest do that!)

No hoses, no dishwashers... Though I will totally be a hypocrite and build a swimming pool when I make it rich...

And absolutely NO washing dishes under a running tap.

Water butt in the garden to water the edible plants with (you shouldn't use ionised water on anything you plan to eat).

(And I am also tight enough to take full advantage of my posh gym membership to wash my hair there several times a week when I'm done working out!)

I do think any shower over 10mins is ridiculously excessive, and I have long hair right down my back (growing out of my head, obviously, I don't mean I'm some kind of freaky bear-woman). Even if you need to shave/exfoliate, then why not stop the water whilst you do that? Then rinse afterwards.

But then, I balk at people who don't fill their washing machines properly. The world will soon become so overpopulated that there won't be enough water to go round, why waste it because you're brushing your teeth with the tap running?

I don't disregard the money but I budget for guests costing me money. They may have invited themselves but once they are in my home, they are guests and are treated as such. Of course I think 40 minutes of showers is silly but there are people on here that wash towels everyday, tumble dry, then wash sheets every couple and tumble dry. People do weird things and as guests, they get to feel comfortable in my home.

Are you sure it's that much OP? We are metered and ds and Dh each have 20 min showers every day,I have a ten min one, washing machine, dish washer, big garden that needs a lot of water etc and our bill is 40-50 quid a month.

I can't believe the number of posters who think 20 minutes in a shower is acceptable. Our instant heat shower has an isolation valve outside the shower room and I'd be using it if any guest took 20 minutes unless they'd been shovelling coal

TBH, I am not a penny pincher or a clock watcher, but that would annoy me. 40 minutes a day per person? I take 2showers a day- AND have long hair, and I do not take that long by any stretch of the imagination.

But, I hate having guests. We are lucky enough to live in an area of outstanding natural beauty and our summers are usually filled up with the self-invited guests. By the end of the summer some of these people cannot even blink their eyes without it irritating me.

DameDiazapam We live in Northumberland, have a largish garden- 80ft and never have to water it because it is never that hot here and rains a lot. No water shortages, ever. Water not metered. Pay £32.00 a month.

The reservoirs are constantly full and one huge one - Keilder- is rarely used as a reservoir. It has become a sailing, holiday, walking, wildlife place.

One of the advantages of the cold North East.

you can't say anything as they are guests but that is phenomenally wasteful of water - even washing hair and shaving legs, I would be 15 mins max. One of those showers can surely only need to be a few minutes as presumably nobody washes their hair/shaves their legs twice a day? I think whether you can afford it or not is irrelevant.

Absolutely astonished at the number of people on this thread who think it's fine - though, actually, when I think about the amount of laundry a lot of MNers do, wasting water doesn't seem to bother a lot of you at all so I probably shouldn't be surprised.

However, if the bathroom houses the only loo in the house then they are being very inconsiderate as well, and I would have a word about that. If I'm staying with someone who has just the one loo/bathroom, I make sure I'm in and out in double quick time.

It is one of the misfortunes of living in the South West. People bang on a lot about the cost of living in London, but, actually, it's pretty bloody hard here too. And we don't have the London salaries to help out with it.

I have 2 or 3 showers a day in summer! and I think I usually stay in there for 10-15 minutes. The water company won't let me have a meter though so I use as much water as I can on principle.

I never got the "getting my money's worth" thing when it only leads to waste.

It's like getting some of those mini jams from a buffet of something. It then sits in the cupboard and gets thrown out five years later.

Using what you need - ok, but wasting on principle, not really.

yes best not to take anything for granted, water is precious and I think it is important to exercise good stewardship of it.

also I would be considerate if I was a house guest.

Man, I desperately want one of those mini jams now.

Seems this is a long time to shower to be honest, but I think you have to chalk it up to experience OP. I had a visitor for two weeks that cost me and arm and a leg AND she invited herself to stay, ignoring my protests that it was a really bad time for my family. She came anyway and caused all sorts of dramas with my kids, husband etc, started clearing out cupboards, telling my kids what to do even when I'd said the opposite. I just had to chalk it up to experience and have distanced myself from her enough to know she won't be repeating her visit. But that is a whole other story, lol.

last time my mother stayed with us for 6 weeks our water usage doubled! We now have to pay £60 a month

Now I'm not even sure if I'm being unreasonable! Pretty divided on here. I certainly didn't expect my water usage to increase so much, still don't agree with wasting valuable resources just because you have the money to do so.