Neighbour's water supply pipes in our garden

[findingsomeone]

Old houses...supply water pipe comes into our garden and supplies us and three other houses.

Long story short, we have been fucked over by a water leak ongoing for several months. This was not in a pipe we jointly own, but one belonging to neighbours.

It is looking increasingly likely that the main supply pipe from our property boundary to everyone needs to be replaced. We all own 1/4 of it until it splits off to the varying houses. Given we have been royally fucked over, I would like supply pipes to be installed for each property, and only mine to come via my garden.

Does anyone have any knowledge or experience as to whether we can insist on this? There is nothing in deeds to say we have to have everyone else's supply in our garden. I don't care about drainage etc because the water company owns shared ones of those. But shared supply pipes belong to the homeowners. And muggins here is getting limped with all the issues and all the £

I don't know any of legalities... but I would be wanting whatever it has cost you due to the faulty pipe refunded before any work can commence...

It sounds like a sensible time to split the supply if possible.

What do your deeds say?
My neighbours water supply crosses our property, but it is owned by the water company and their access and what they can dig up is a very defined area in the deeds. It is worth investigating this.

Thanks both.

@Lonecatwithkitten the deeds say nothing at all about access or water pipes.

Water companies own shared drainage pipes, but supply pipes are privately owned, and it's the supply pipe that had been causing issues. As it supplies four houses it is owned by the four of us, so the water company won't have anything to do with it.

@LittleOwl153 this is the thing, whilst the issue should theoretically now be fixed we worry more is to come, and that it would be best to separate supply pipes now

@findingsomeone

Thanks both.

@Lonecatwithkitten the deeds say nothing at all about access or water pipes.

Water companies own shared drainage pipes, but supply pipes are privately owned, and it's the supply pipe that had been causing issues. As it supplies four houses it is owned by the four of us, so the water company won't have anything to do with it.

@LittleOwl153 this is the thing, whilst the issue should theoretically now be fixed we worry more is to come, and that it would be best to separate supply pipes now

It is not always the case that water companies own supply pipes it depends on the history of the supply pipes.

@Lonecatwithkitten ours absolutely are owned as I have described.

It won't cost you anything to get an inspector from the local water company to give you the benefit of his/her advice.
Do you share a boundary/external stop tap?

Try your insurers. They may advise on legal position if nothing else. Do you have legal cover on building insurance to pursue neighbours? You can insist Water Company gives you a private connection to the mains so you are not sharing with neighbours . Water Co. is legally obliged to do this. You can do this without neighbours consent. You have to pay Water Company for it. Company should publish charges. I don't think you can force neighbours to do the same. However, Water Co. are supposed to stop water waste from supply pipes. If owners won't fix leak,Water Co can step in to get it done and bill them. Solicitor's letter to get neighbours to pay up for repairing leak. OfWat regulate Water Companies so get onto them if the Water Co mess you around.

I've had the water company out a few times. This is how we established what pipes belong to which party, because the water company won't touch any of it as it's 'nothing to do with them'.

We share a supply pipe which then splits off. We all have separate stop cocks in our own properties. The leak identified was after the pipe splits off to our house, so in reality nothing to do with us. But sadly no one else gave a shiny shit about fixing it..!

Maybe turn the external stop tap off to reduce the leaking. They'll soon get it sorted when they have no water.

Water companies own the supply pipe up to the boundary, as you say, after that it’s your issue.

I’d suggest you get a new supply direct to your house from the street main, completely separate from the shared supply. Then you have no vested interest in the thing. Not sure what the situation would be regards access to repair or damage caused by the shared pipe in the future (once you’re off it). On for the solicitors/insurance.

Side note - what sort of pipe is it? If lead supply, most water companies have incentives/schemes to support replacement with plastic.

Side side note - are you on a meter? How does it work with a shared supply? If you’re not on a meter, would requesting one from the water company jog in them into some sort of action?

We got the leak repaired because it was leaking litres a minute into our garden and the neighbour's reckoned 'not our garden, not our problem' it seems it was a slower leak for months and suddenly got worse.

I will try house insurance, dreading the hassle to get through to them!

As for are we on a meter...the water company installed one to measure our usage but not charge us off a while ago. Wouldn't listen to me when I said there was no point because it would measure everybody's use, but they did it anyway. Since this leak they now realise it measures everybody. Thankfully not being metered means we aren't penalised in any way for the water loss.

The pipe is indeed lead. Apparently they won't offer any help to replace it, they have no schemes running anymore. They will replace up to our boundary and then it's our problem.

We felt we had no choice but to get the repair done because we were at risk of getting areas of our property flooded or damaged. The water company said they could start some kind of enforcement action but it wouldn't have been fast.

My fear is that there will be ongoing problems with the shared pipe, which is why I'm tempted to look at getting our own supply. I just wish there was a way to stop them having their pipes on our land and us having the suck up the issues as described here. I worry half my garden will need excavating if they have problems in the future even if we have our own supply. Legally I am sure they will 'need' suitable access for problems.

Installing new pipes is often easier than fixing old ones. No need to dig up the garden, pipes are laid with a mole (pushes the pipe underground between two pits).

Sooner you are off the leaky shared main tyr better.

You cannot make your neighbours instal new water pipes. They won’t by the sound of it and you cannot enforce it or cut off their water. You can install your own water supply but that wont stop theirs leaking again. I would sort it out as best you can and sell. You won’t win this one but I feel for you.

I’ve had a couple of properties with water pipe complications. One where a neighbours supply crossed my garden. I replaced the lead with plastic at my expense when have the garden landscaped as I didn’t want leak issues.
The next house I was at the end of the line as the water pipe came in one house, travelled through a couple more supplying them and finally to me. Middle houses had replaced their stretches of pipe with plastic about 20 years ago. I did mine shortly after moving in and then finally first house replaced the lead with plastic.
Lead does leak after awhile and although everyone should have contributed in the last house to the bits before them in reality no one was even asked. If you replace the lead with plastic it will be fine for years. If you want your neighbours to contribute you may have to reduce the flow and make it difficult for them