Do people drink water from the bathroom tap tap

[KW33]

Back story is I work in a perdomately male work place. We have a small coffee machine that needs to be filled up with water every so often. The unisex toilets are not too far from where the team sit. On two separate occasions, one male manager went into the bathroom to fill up the water. I interjected and said no, I will get water from the water despenser in the kitchen which is not close to where the team sit. Then the same thing happened today, another male colleague went to do the same thing. I again interjected and got the water from the kitchen water despenser. When I asked the colleague today, he said it's the same water tank so why wouldn't you use the tap water from the bathroom. I said no that's disgusting at which point another male colleague said there's no difference. He would use his tap water in the bathroom at home. Again I was lost.

So now I want to know is this a thing? I have never used the bathroom tap water as drinking water and never would. However this might be a me thing, or is it a woman thing. I have now started asking everyone....even though what one of them said about it being from the same tank may be true. In my head the kitchen tap water can be used for drinking and the bathroom tap water is for washing your hands etc. Has anyone else had a similar experience or thing to be amazed at what some people class as normal and you class as disgusting.

When we moved into our house we discovered we still had a lead mains pipe so it was either drink lead or drink infusion of drowned squirrel. I now have a plastic mains pipe and a mains pressure tank

I would hate that. Sinks are for washing your hands and they are small so you'd have to touch the sink or even the tap with the coffee jug and that's just rank. It may sound silly but something about it makes me nauseous. I'd fill up a water glass from my own bathroom sink but I know that's clean and I wouldn't need to touch the glass to the sink or tap.

Logically I know that the bathroom taps in my new build house are fed from the mains and are the same as the kitchen sink … but psychologically I can’t drink from them … it just feels wrong, having grown up in an older house and being told not to! Even in a hotel I won’t drink from the bathroom tap … I buy bottled water instead which is crazy I know!

Yes I remember having a tank and being told not to drink bathroom water, so it’s stuck. I’ve also seen some places that have big signs in the toilets saying “not suitable for drinking”

I do it occasionally on holiday but generally I avoid because it’s habit.

Us too, every night.

We have cold water tanks in the loft but I still drink water from the bathroom taps.

Do you honestly think there’s some hugely complicated water network under the roads with different pipes that are specifically setup for different rooms?!

We don't drink from our bathroom taps as it comes from a tank. The kitchen water comes from the mains.

My bathroom tap is from a water tank, so no. Mains fed only for drinking water, not tanked.

I was taught not to because in our old house, the bathroom taps were fed from a tank which didn't necessarily stay clean while drinking water came from kitchen taps directly from mains. In more modern buildings it may all come from the mains with no tank in between.

In some older houses, the bathroom tap was supplied from the cold water storage tank in the loft, which could be stale and dusty, and have sediment. The kitchen tap was supplied from the mains, so fresh and uncontaminated. Depends on your plumbing. In our old Victorian house I wouldn't drink the upstairs tap water, but in our 1960s house, all cold taps are mains water, so I could use any of them.

If it’s coming from the same place (mains) fine, from a storage tank I wouldn’t.

I wouldnt drink from the bathroom tap - unless desperate - its in a stored rubber tank and does taste different from tap water from the mains. I certaintly would not use bathroom tap water from work - no idea where its coming from or where its stored.

My house was built in 2000 and has storage tanks in the loft

I drink cold water from the bathroom tap - it’s fine.

In a non domestic building, if the cold water can't be used for drinking, it must have a sign saying so. Cold water is mains fed in the vast majority of buildings over about 40 years old.

It entirely depends on where your water comes from. All newer built homes have mains water throughout and plastic pipes, it literally is the same water throughout and potable at every outlet. Old houses would have been built with a water tank where the water was standing and therefore not fit for drinking and cooking. Only the kitchen tap would have been direct to mains. As many older houses have been renovated it is possible that the water tank has been removed so it is important to understand where your water is coming from.

Commercial premises are different in that it is much less common for mains at all outlets and it would be reasonable to assume that the water has come from a tank in toilet areas. Kitchen taps that are mains should be labelled drinking water otherwise potable water via bottled supply or filtered should be provided.

One of the things to bear in mind about tanked water is... how often is the tank inspected? Is it a plastic covered tank? Is it clean and undamaged? It would not be unknown for dead animals to end up in tanks.

I drink water from my bathroom tap and have drunk water from the bathroom tap in previous homes. I wouldn't faff about with wandering downstairs in the night for water when I can get it upstairs.

Your work set up is different in that it depends on how regularly the space is cleaned, what the layout of the basin/tap is. I'd be more suspicious of hygiene in your office. But if the water is just coming out of a tap and into the water container for your coffee machine without the container touching anything in the toilet space then it's unlikely to be unhygienic.

Why wouldn’t you? It’s the same water? The bathroom tap doesn’t take its water from the loo!
I use whichever tap is nearest to me.

This. I live in a flat now and the coldest nicest water comes from my bathroom.

The tap tap?! 🤣

Depends if it's mains or tank fed. Most are now mains fed so it would be fine for drinking but it still feels weird as I grew up with a tank - fine for brushing teeth and swilling out, but you wouldn't want to drink it. Drinking water was always from the kitchen mains fed tap.

I don't.
DH does.

Is the water being boiled?

I mean it wouldn't bother me if it's all the same tank.

When i grew up, we had a cold water tank, and once feathers and maggots came soluttering out of the bath taps... some poor bird had flown into the loft and fallen in the tank, which apparently had a very shoddy lid. (All a bit basic and we were pretty poor).

Even though everything is on mains now, I remain cautious about that kind of thing...I would boil water from the bathroom in my house but would never drink straight from the tap even though I know my system is totally fine!

So I get your reticence, but apparently we really shouldn't worry.

Tanks are still used where water pressure may not be sufficient. But old tanks used to be pretty much open (we had a pigeon get into ours and die once!), newer tanks are built to a different standard and should be sealed. Providing they are properly installed and get checked that they haven't deteriorated from time to time, they should be safe to drink from.