Just got our first daily water use info for our water meter

[Motnight]

It's 1180 litres. I am gobsmacked.

3 bedroomed house. 2 of us living here permanently, occasional visits from a 3rd person! Both working mostly at home. Around 10 loads of washing a week, dishwasher used once a day. 2 showers and 1 bath a day (bath is deep). Bath is taken by husband who has a life long illness which leaves him in lots of physical pain, which is helped by a bath.

Is this normal? The useful info provided says that a typical 2 person household should use around 270 metres a day. Do we have a leak or are we just using appalling amounts of water? If the latter, any tips on reducing this? Thankyou.

Have you checked the capacity of your bath? Baths use loads and loads of water.

And you are running your washing machine almost twice a day for two, sometimes three people? And the dishwasher once a day. I wouldn't have thought 2 people would fill the dishwasher every day.

While washing is not cleaned properly if the machine is over loaded I have seen how MIL washes. She puts hardly anything in her machine and always uses an extra rinse cycle.

There are three adults in our house, DS plays football twice a week. We do 4 a week.

What size is your washing machine op? If you need to do 10 loads a week I assume it doesn't have a large capacity? We are a family of 4 and do 6 a week.

See if your husband can skip the shower on days he has a bath, ideally alternate days so he also cuts the amount of baths across the week without cutting them out altogether the baths are part of treatment for a significant medical condition, it isn't OK to expect him to cut those. If they can't afford the bill, they need to be making other cuts

@BestKnitterInScotland

Why is one person having both a bath and a shower daily?

And 10 loads of washing for 2 people is a huge amount. There are 5 of us here (2 adults, 3 teenagers) and I do about 4 or 5 a week.

I would say how can do you only do 4/5 a week for 5 people!!! We wash towels once a week (2 loads with hand towels and other bits of washing) bedding once a week - 2 loads. Thats 4 washes without any clothes!

@SeasonFinale

10 loads of washing for 2/3 people seems excessive for a start.

There are 2 of us here. 1 load whites, 1 load colours,1 load bedding, 1load towels. That's 4. How on earth are you doing 10.

Wow! How long are the showers? If you're standing under them for 30 mins each that's like 2 extra baths full!

And 10 loads of washing? I don't think I even do that in a month!!!

We are a 2.5 person household and use just over 300 litres per day (DD has a bath almost every day). If you need to do that many loads, maybe look at your washing machine manual and work out the most economical setting. I use the quick wash setting for clothes that aren't dirty (most economical on my machine) and the eco 40 for underwear, towels, bedding etc.

Given one wash cycle uses between 50-100l, I suspect it's the greatest contributor to your usage.

Dishwasher on every 2 or 3 days

Can DH reduce the depth of his baths at all? I know they are essential for his condition but it is easy to over fill them. The showers, keep them as short as possible. Maybe consider having a flannel wash one day a week unless you're going out/doing manual stuff. You keep your bed sheets nice and clean so shouldn't get too smelly on a lazy day. Don't wash hair each time as that can add time to the shower. Wash your clothes much less. Check toilet for leaks. Do you have an eco flush on your toilet? Make sure you use that one. Consider not flushing for each wee if you can stand it.

1180 litres. A day???!! Are you sure?

We're a family of four adults and got the water bill on Saturday and I just checked it. Ours works out at 360 litres a day. I'm amazed we got through that much, but it is estimated this time.

Contact Water sure op...

I need to check his many

But

2 a showers daily
Washing machine x4 a week
Dw daily

I just checked my bill for comparison. Two of us. I actually have a lot of baths also due to my health condition.

206 litres a day! 7m3 a month. And I’ve been having a go at DP saying we need to keep it down as our bill has increased. It must be the washing machine OP.

Around 10 loads of washing a week, dishwasher used once a day. 2 showers and 1 bath a day (bath is deep). Bath is taken by husband who has a life long illness which leaves him in lots of physical pain, which is helped by a bath.

Is this normal?

No its not normal. You are using a lot of water. 10 loads of washing a week?! Wow.

And the 2 showers and a bath per day for 2 people?! Even with an illness, thats a lot.

Only your dishwasher use is near normal, and tbh with only 2 of you I suspect you probably could run it once every other day.

Learn wear clothes more than once a day ocasionally (underwear excluded). You won't die.

I suppose this is why there is a drive to install water meters - so people look at what they are using more carefully.

As others have said OP, whereas you seem to be doing an excessive amount of washing and running the dishwasher a lot more than we did during the brief spell there were only two of us here, that still seems a lot, so would be worth getting your water company to check.

Do you need to run dishwasher daily ? Two of us and I’m at home all day and we run jt every three days on average and that’s with everything apart from large saucepans being dishwashed

@Motnight

It's 1180 litres. I am gobsmacked.

3 bedroomed house. 2 of us living here permanently, occasional visits from a 3rd person! Both working mostly at home. Around 10 loads of washing a week, dishwasher used once a day. 2 showers and 1 bath a day (bath is deep). Bath is taken by husband who has a life long illness which leaves him in lots of physical pain, which is helped by a bath.

Is this normal? The useful info provided says that a typical 2 person household should use around 270 metres a day. Do we have a leak or are we just using appalling amounts of water? If the latter, any tips on reducing this? Thankyou.

There's a leak.

The activities you've described do not get close to 1180 litres per day (unless your bath is a small swimming pool, or your shower is some sort of rain-forest-monsoon model with jets in all directions and you stay in there for 45 mins

I am thinking your washing is too much. Are you just chucking clothes in the laundry after 1 use where you could get more out of it? My DH use to do this! We are a family of 5 and probably have 5/6 washes a week.

I would imagine for 2 that should be 3 washes a week.

Are your washing machine and dishwasher old, less efficient models?

We do ten loads a week for five people, easily. It would be more if I were so fastidious about washing towels and bed linen as other people on MN. It takes two loads to wash just DH and my bed as the duvet cover is so massive and it all gets too creased if you put it in with the sheet and pillowcases.

@BertieBotts

Are your washing machine and dishwasher old, less efficient models?

Yes this is what I am also thinking. Some models really guzzle water!

Don't confuse litres with metres.

I just read that a litre of water costs less than 1p, a cubic metre costs £3.08.

www.unitedutilities.com/your-questions-answered/bills-payments/what-does-a-litre-or-cubic-metre-of-water-cost/

Thanks for all the further responses. To answer a few questions, the washing machine is just over 2 years old and we always use the eco wash program. The dish washer is about 10 years old, but again we use the eco wash program.

Our showers definitely last less than 10 minutes each, and I only wash my hair twice a week.

I am going to contact our water company to see if they can help us at all, even with us using the washing machine every day and a deep bath it seems excessive.

Ours is 518 litres a day, three adults and two teenagers so for two people, more than double that for two people sounds insane and I would question their readings.

"Our most efficient neighbours" use 246 litres a day. "Average neighbour use" is 346 a day. Well, those households will be smaller than ours, there are a lot of older people in bungalows and houses on their own, and a lot of couples. Ours isn't too bad if you work it out per person.

Average water use per person per day is 142 litres, so ours is less than that at 100L per person.

When we first had our meter installed they told us we use 40% less water than the average family of four (there were four of us then). Mucky!