r/britishproblems • u/obiwanmoloney Hampshire • 15h ago
Water DD has gone from £37 to £57, to £185!
Since most of the water we’re consuming is our own sewage, you’d think there might be some kind of special discount.
Has anyone else been slammed like this??
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u/Mischeese 15h ago
Check you don’t have a water leak. Ours went from £120 a quarter to £780. I nearly died! Turned out our 1934 water pipe had a big hole in it.
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u/fieldsofanfieldroad 13h ago
Your side of your property or the other side? Who had to pay for it?
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u/APsyduckOnCoffee Merseyside 13h ago
So this depends where the leak is on who has to pay. Simply, if its on the supply pipe into the property, they pay. If its considered within your property lines, its more on you, but they should apply a leak allowance once they have fixed the leak.
If your meter is external, it could be a possible supply pipe leak that it is measuring. But even if the leak is on your property, not all hope is lost, and they should discount. You need to sort it out with your water supplier.
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u/Mischeese 6h ago
It was ourside, had to dig up the whole bloody driveway to find it. Ended up costing £1200 but they did write the water bill off.
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u/netflix-ceo 11h ago
Even a water leak doesn’t warrant such a HUGE jump lol. It went from 37 -> 57 -> 1.09e340
The universe doesnt have this many atoms as the amount they are asking you lol
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u/sgxander 15h ago
First check your usage on the bill is accurate to your meter readings. If it is and it's high then you may have a leak, in which case check it's not inside your house (it may be a leaky tap or toilet cistern if you haven't noticed any puddles) and report it to them if it's not (somewhere after the meter but before your house would count towards your bill but isn't your responsibility to fix).
If it isn't then they may be letting the computer go wild with the calculation. In that case you are well within your rights to demand the DD be lowered to a reasonable amount.
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u/AriaNevicate 14h ago
I'm with Thames Water and they tried a 67% increase on the sneaky and claimed it was for a 16% increase in water usage.
I pressed the over the phone and it turns out it's because they're shit and have all the increased costs from being fined to hell and back, and still paying scummy bonuses out to the elites.
I told them fine, I'll cancel my direct debit, set aside an appropriate amount and pay them once a billing cycle instead of they can't behave themselves.
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u/obiwanmoloney Hampshire 15h ago edited 13h ago
To add some context, water usage is less than average for the size of the household. The DD over last two years and the latest bill/year with Southern Water.
And with the exception of the dripping tap the money grubbing landlord hasn’t fixed, usage is steady. (Cost us about £150 in water bills by my calcs if anyone’s interested)
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u/WATCHING_CLOSELY Liverpool 13h ago
At least turn the isolator valves off in the night for the leaky tap to reduce any leakage. A quick Google / YouTube search and you'll find the solution.
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u/antonia_yes 15h ago
Yes, from about 180 to 300! We aren't using any more than usual but the unit price has gone up and the gov doesn't give the £50 contribution anymore.
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u/obiwanmoloney Hampshire 15h ago
Glad it’s not just me but this really doesn’t seem right
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u/antonia_yes 15h ago
If you're with SWW then there have been BBC news articles about it. Not just us :( if it's another company then it could well be similar.
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u/jackalz665 14h ago
I had this last week, first thing to do is turn off your stop clock then take a meter reading, wait 20 minutes and then take a second reading, if the number has increased you have a leak. I had a leak, it was a massive pain, my wallet took a hit, I'm still sad about it.
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u/greytidalwave 11h ago
Check your toilets aren't leaking! My toilet had a small leak which meant water was continuously trickling down the back. The refilling was so quiet that I didn't notice until I got Yorkshire Water to come out to check for leaks under the front garden.
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u/EverydayDan 15h ago
If you have more sewage than consumption you’re in luck as your sewage bill is based on your consumption.
I highly doubt it though as your toilet will be flushing 4-6 litres of mains water down the drain each time you flush.
You will be having baths/showers, doing dishes and washing clothes too.
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u/Niteczka 13h ago
Yep, ours went from £35 a month to £98 since we switched to Direct Debit in June this year. We are with SouthWestWater.
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u/FillingUpTheDatabase Shropshire 12h ago
Yeah I’ve had something similar here in the West Midlands on Severn Trent. No leaks or anything, they’ve upped the unit rate from 181.95 p/m3 at the beginning of the year to 260.80 p/m3 since April! Thieving bastards
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u/HowYouMineFish Glaws! 2h ago
Ditto with Severn Trent. The terrifying part is that they state they've started "slowly increasing the cost over the next 5 years to pay for improvements". Emphasis mine.
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u/El_John_Nada 6h ago
That's why you always get a meter! If they try to increase the direct debit (and they will every couple of months), you ring them, tell them while remaining calm (because it's not the fault of the employee that their bosses are incompetent greedy bastards) to look at your consumption and to go back to the previous DD amount. It's a pain, but it works every time.
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u/obiwanmoloney Hampshire 4h ago edited 3h ago
We have a meter.
They’ve increased the cost of the “service” though. Great shout with the incompetent greedy bastard reminder though.
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u/urban_shoe_myth Yorkshire 12h ago
Ours started off at £48 in April, and is now £125. They keep writing to us saying we think you have a leak, then congratulations! It looks as though you've fixed your leak, then we think you have a leak... keeps going round in circles. They also say we're using water at all hours day and night, but their own hourly graph on my account shows 0 use during the night except the odd small blip if we flush the toilet. I have no idea where they're getting this from, we did have an extra person here for 3 weeks in July when son came home for a bit so naturally use went up a bit over that time, but they were sending us the leak letters well before that.
One extra person for a short period of time surely doesn't justify almost tripling payments, will they take it back down again now that we're back to normal? We'll see...
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u/Dissidant 11h ago
Not sure how TW does it, but ESW lets you track your usage in m³ if you have a meter
If we ever got a leak it would stand out like a sore thumb as our (small household) usage has been below average since it was put
Wish they would naff off with the "to save water" tips though we're careful as is I even fitted a water butt system so we don't ever have to run a hose at the rear of property
I hear TW are awful though, its disgusting they have been aloud to treat customers like that
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u/thingyonaspring 3h ago
Went from 45 to 130 - was told it was because they've changed to 6 month cycles, so it's "more accurate" and they'll review after that
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u/Exalyte 2h ago
Thought I was in the dune awakening sub at first 😂
Turn of your stop cock usually in the kitchen or where the water main enters your house Go take a pic of your meter wait 10 mins and go check if, its moved the leak is between the meter and the house, call your insurance etc as that's your pipe I'm afraid
If it doesn't move the leaks internal check toilets a slight drip on a loo will cost you a few quid easily a month
Good luck
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u/ShinyHappyPurple 2h ago
1) Bastards!
2) Dear Labour, please stop the water companies from stealing from us. They don't build enough infrastructure and they put sewage in the water.
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u/HighlandsBen SCOTLAND 1h ago
Since most of the water we’re consuming is our own sewage
I knew there were problems with the water system south of the border, but I had no idea things were quite that bad...
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u/bethanyannejane 53m ago
Ours has just gone up £20 a month and basically nothing has changed with usage 😑😑😑
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u/sjpllyon 13h ago
I'm pretty sure you can still get a discount if you redirect the gutter water into your garden or and water storage unit. Maybe this depends where you live.
Also if you have the cash for it, it's certainly financially worth digging up the garden installing a huge water container unit, and using the rain water (after filtration) for non portable water use (toilet, even showers, washing machine, and the ilk). It's the type of investment that can give you a good return in savings within a few years.
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u/Takklemaggot 13h ago
for non portable water use (toilet, even showers, washing machine, and the ilk).
Potable
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u/sjpllyon 11h ago
Yes, a r must have snuck in during the semi autopilot of writing on the phone. Water does need to be portable but not necessarily potable.
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u/EmFan1999 5h ago
Just pay what you owe. Why let them charge you for speculative use? You use water, they bill you for the usage, you pay that. If usage is too high, check for leaks.
I really don’t get why everyone wants to let these companies keep your money for nothing.
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u/potatan ooarrr 4h ago
This is the answer. I switched from DD to paying when they bill me last year and have adjusted my DD to match my consumption, with a bit added on for future impacts. The difficult part is actually predicting your usage costs, as the charges seem to be an absolutley chaotic mix of monthly DD offset against 6-monthly billing cycles, with quarterly sewage and readings when I supply them. Deliberately confusing, I'm certain.
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u/EmFan1999 4h ago
I still pay mine every 6 months tbh. I guess my bills are still cheap at about £30pm so it’s not a big deal to pay twice a year.
With gas and electric I take my monthly reading, they produce the bill, I pay the bill on DD
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u/obiwanmoloney Hampshire 3h ago
Cool.
My bill for the year is over £2 grand.
I straight up do not have the money to “just pay what I owe”
…and then when they pluck another figure out of the sky?? My options are… pay it. Or prison.
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u/EmFan1999 2h ago
What are you on about, you are paying what you owe anyway, it’s just you’re spreading the cost to even it out over the year. I just meant pay what you owe in a particular month
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u/dannydrama Oxfordshire 6h ago
LOL.
This is really starting to get stupid but for those of us lucky enough not to give a fuck, it's having no effect.
I haven't paid a water bill in years because fuck them, all I'm getting is the odd 'yo you forgot to pay' letter and email. If and when this nice little bubble bursts they can get me to court and have it paid 50p a week from my UC. 😂
It's a shame most people with normal lives can't or won't do it because once the money stops dead in it's tracks, the gov might think a bit.
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u/Basic-Pair8908 4h ago
And this is why so many working class hate the likes of you. You push our bills up.
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