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A private leakage notice is a letter from your water company saying it believes water is leaking from a pipe you are responsible for, and giving you a deadline to fix it. The legal power comes from Section 75 of the Water Industry Act 1991. It lets a water company serve a notice when it believes water is being wasted through a fitting that isn’t its own, such as your supply pipe.
The deadline
The Act says the notice must give you at least 7 days, counted from the day after it is served. In practice notices often give longer: the BBC reported in August 2026 that a Private Leakage Notification typically gives 28 days. The date that counts is the one on your notice.
If the work isn’t done in time, the company can carry it out itself and recover its reasonable costs from you. It can also disconnect the supply in an emergency, or if the property appears to be unoccupied. It can’t recover costs for work that turns out not to have been necessary.
Using the time well
Most of the deadline goes on finding the leak, so start there. A meter test confirms the loss is on your supply pipe, then the leak is located with underground water leak detection and fixed through one hole with a supply pipe repair. You get a report, photos and an invoice to send back as proof.
If the pipe is shared with neighbours, the notice may have gone to more than one house. See shared supply pipe leaks.
What's included
- Read-through of the notice and its deadline
- Meter test to confirm the leak is yours
- Supply pipe route traced
- Leak located and marked
- Repair through one hole
- Pressure test after the repair
- Photos, report and invoice as proof
- Advice on claiming the leakage allowance
How the options compare
Deadline
- Do it yourself
- Missed while searching
- Dig-and-hope operator
- Met, sometimes
- Proper leak detection
- Planned from day one
If you miss it
- Do it yourself
- The company may do the work and bill you
- Dig-and-hope operator
- Same risk
- Proper leak detection
- Avoided
Proof of repair
- Do it yourself
- None
- Dig-and-hope operator
- An invoice
- Proper leak detection
- Report, photos and invoice
Water charges
- Do it yourself
- Paid in full
- Dig-and-hope operator
- Paid in full
- Proper leak detection
- Leakage allowance claimed
