Water

Summary

Mrs C complained that Scottish Water had failed to consult the public about planned work to the water supply in her area and that since this reduction in the water pressure, equipment in her house and her central heating boiler were not working properly. She said that it was unreasonable for Scottish Water to reduce the pressure, rather than repairing or replacing pipes and upgrading the mains for which they were responsible.

Our investigation found no evidence that Scottish Water had a requirement to consult their customers about this work. It had been undertaken in stages, and Scottish Water told us that the majority of their customers in the area would not have noticed any change. We did consider whether it would be appropriate to ask Scottish Water to consider consulting in future but they told us that a problem had been reported in only a handful of cases, and that they had followed these up and either taken action or provided advice to the customer where it was a matter for them to resolve.

We found that Scottish Water had chosen to reduce the pressure because they considered that there were a number of benefits from this. We found nothing to suggest that there was anything wrong with their decision-making in this respect. In Mrs C's case, she had been provided with additional support, and as Scottish Water had found that the problems she was experiencing were related to water flow rather than pressure, they had installed new pipe work from the main pipe to the boundary of her property, and had reimbursed her for the costs of engaging a plumber to fix an issue with her sanitary ware.

Summary

Mr C complained that his water bills had been inaccurate and too confusing to follow. For example, at one point he thought his account was in credit but he then received a reminder for payment. Our investigation revealed that there had been errors on the account and a lack of good communication with Mr C about them. For example, when an error was identified and put right on a later invoice, the charges on that later invoice were not made clear to him, so he was unaware that they were caused by correcting the earlier error. Therefore, we upheld Mr C's complaint. However, as we were satisfied that Business Stream had now put all errors right, we made no recommendations.

Summary

Mr C leased and operated a pub that shared its water supply with a residential property. He complained that Business Stream unreasonably delayed in issuing their initial invoice – he had run the pub since 2007 and only received an invoice in 2010 – and that when it arrived it was unreasonably high. Mr C felt that this was at least partly attributable to the meter serving more than one property.

Although Mr C maintained that he had notified Scottish Water of his occupancy of the premises concerned in 2007, our investigation did not find evidence to confirm this and noted that as soon as Business Stream knew of his occupancy in 2010, they began issuing bills. However, the bills were for both business and domestic premises. We did find that took too long for Business Stream to provide an appropriate meter in Mr C's premises. Because of this, the bills issued were incorrectly based and Mr C had paid twice for his domestic use (through both the metered charges and his council tax).

Recommendations

We recommended that Business Stream:

• make a formal apology for their role in the delay in providing an appropriate meter; and
• in the event of Mr C providing information to allow Scottish Water to refund overpaid charges, agree to refund him any difference in the cost.

Summary

Mr C's business occupied premises in a large office building. His office did not have its own water supply, but had access to the building's communal water facilities. In January 2013, Business Stream contacted Mr C and told him that he was liable for drainage charges accrued over five years. Mr C did not feel that his business should be liable for these charges, as his occupancy was agreed under a license with the property owner rather than a tenancy agreement. He said his office was not directly connected to a water supply and the terms of his license placed full responsibility for the building's fixtures and fittings on the licensor. Mr C also raised concerns about Business Stream's handling of his complaints.

Mr C had questioned whether his premises were 'eligible premises' as defined by the Water Services etc (Scotland) Act 2005. This defines premises that are eligible for water and drainage charges as those that are (or are to be) connected to the public water and sewerage systems. Although it is not for us to interpret this legislation, we investigated whether Business Stream gave proper consideration to relevant factors when reaching their decision. We found that they were obliged to set up their charges in accordance with the market code (which sets out the duties of participants in the water market, and provides technical specifications). Business Stream's treatment of Mr C's premises as an 'eligible premises' was in line with the code, which in turn was based on the legislation.

Mr C felt that all water and drainage charges for his premises should be charged to the property owner (licensor) rather than him, given his status as a licensee. Again, it was not for us to determine what status Mr C's license gave him, or what difference this might make in terms of who should be liable for charges. However, we were satisfied that Business Stream made appropriate enquiries to establish who should be charged, and reached a reasonable conclusion based on the information provided to them.

We were critical that Business Stream did not clearly explain to Mr C the reasoning behind their decision to charge his business for drainage, but we found that they responded to all of his correspondence in good time.

Recommendations

We recommended that Business Stream:

• take steps to improve the level of detail in their customer correspondence so that full explanations are given as to the reasoning behind their decisions; and
• apologise to Mr C for their failure to properly explain the reasoning behind charging him for drainage.

Summary

Mr C's complaint was made on behalf of a charity, who had received an unexpected bill from Business Stream for water service charges two years after they moved into their premises. Mr C complained both that the charity was being incorrectly pursued for charges because an exemption had been applied in their previous premises, and about the action taken by Business Stream to pursue payment, including threatening disconnection. He also complained of delay in issuing invoices, and confusion about the number of meters serving the premises, resulting in the wrong charges being pursued. He also said that there had been delay in resolving a separate error when invoices for other companies had been received at the charity's address.

From our investigation, we established that while the charity had discussed whether exemption applied, they had not provided evidence to support this or submitted a claim for exemption. We upheld the complaint about disconnection, however, as our investigation found that Business Stream had sent a letter to the premises in which disconnection was threatened if it was found that the premises were unoccupied, despite having known for some six months that they were occupied by the charity. We also found that invoices had been issued wrongly for two meters when the premises had only one, and that Business Stream had failed to explain this when they issued an invoice for amended charges. We did not uphold the complaint about the charity receiving mail for another company, as we found that Business Stream had addressed this.

Recommendations

We recommended that Business Stream:

• apologise for the inaccurate and misleading letter; and
• contact the charity to discuss any remaining queries they may have about usage.

Summary

Mr C complained that for three years Business Stream had failed to read the meter for a village hall run by a committee of volunteers. As a result Mr C had been unaware that the hall had two meters and that there had been a significant increase in consumption. Once the committee were made aware of the increased consumption they took steps to reduce it.

During our investigation we discovered that, during the three year period, Business Stream had taken meter readings for the hall but in the year before the high consumption occurred they had not taken two actual readings. In addition they had only issued invoices for one meter and had incorrectly identified its location.

As a result Business Stream had addressed the accuracy of the location of the meter and had decided not to backdate the second meter charges to when it was installed. However, we considered that had the invoices accurately described the location of the meter Mr C would have been able to identify that there were two meters instead of one and would have had the opportunity to monitor them. Because Business Stream had not read the meters in line with their policy we were unable to identify when the increase in usage occurred, and we made a recommendation about this.

Recommendations

We recommended that Business Stream:

• apologise for the failings identified in our decision letter; and
• consider crediting the account with an amount equivalent to 50 percent of the increased water usage during a specified period.

Summary

Mr C owns a holiday home complex, which has a main water storage tank, and individual tanks serving the accommodation. There was a leak, which was Mr C's responsibility to have repaired. However, when he was billed, Business Stream did not take into account that his premises were served with a soakaway (a gravel-filled channel or pit that helps manage surface water) and did not apply a leak allowance.

After we got in touch with Business Stream, they took action to investigate, and told us that if it was confirmed that there was a soakaway, they would amend Mr C's account. Mr C was satisfied with this as a resolution to his complaint.

Summary

Mr C took over the occupancy of a property in November 2010 and told us that, at about the same time, he asked for a water meter to be installed. He said that, although Scottish Water came to the premises in December 2010, for various reasons they were unable to fit a meter. He complained that because of the delay in installing a water meter, his bills were too high. He said this was demonstrated by comparison with the invoices issued after the meter was installed.

Our investigation confirmed that Mr C took entry in November 2010, but found that neither he nor Business Stream had evidence to support his contention that he had tried to have a meter installed in 2010. There was evidence that after Mr C began receiving water bills in November the following year, he contacted Business Stream who fitted a water meter in December 2011. Mr C had also disputed the rateable value (RV) on which his unmetered bill was being based as it was in the process of being appealed, and Business Stream put his account on hold. When his new RV was confirmed all the unmetered bills he had received were recalculated. On the basis of the evidence provided we found no grounds to uphold Mr C's complaint.

Summary

Mr C complained to us about the level of Business Stream's invoices. He thought his initial invoice – which had been based on a water meter - was too high and claimed that Business Stream had told him that he would be better off moving to unmetered billing. Four water meters were removed from Mr C's premises and an unmetered invoice was applied in place of the original invoice. Although the unmetered invoice was slightly cheaper, Mr C felt that it was still too high. When he complained, he was advised that he might wish to apply for reassessment. This is a process where Business Stream's customers can check whether or not they would be cheaper moving from unmetered to metered charges. Given that he had recently had four meters removed, Mr C remained unhappy and complained to us.

During our investigation, Business Stream confirmed that the initial invoice that Mr C had received was based on a 'bulk' meter. This meant that it served the entire building, while the other three meters removed were 'internal' meters. Although it was not clear whether another occupier's water consumption had been included in the original bulk-metered calculation, we considered that this at least cast doubt over the accuracy of the comparison with the cost of unmetered billing. Because of this, and in light of the fact that Mr C had recently had four meters removed, we took the view that it was unreasonable for them to advise Mr C to consider reassessment. We said that, in these particular circumstances, Business Stream should have taken a more proactive approach in confirming whether Mr C's water consumption could be metered accurately and we upheld Mr C's complaints.

Recommendations

We recommended that Business Stream:

• consider covering the installation cost if, following reassessment, an appropriate meter proves to be cheaper and can reasonably be installed; and
• consider backdating the charges to the point of opening the account, if such a meter is installed.

Summary

Mr C complained that Business Stream were unreasonably pursuing his business for an unusually high bill, which he did not believe he could have run up, as the premises were open only three evenings a week. Mr C thought it more likely that works carried out by Scottish Water outside his premises during the period covered by the bill were responsible. He said that the trenches they dug were full of water and that this was likely to have caused the high reading.

Mr C provided us with a statement from his plumber that he had attended the property, but had not fixed a leak. He had not previously given Business Stream this information. Mr C also said that he had complained directly to the contractors, but had not contacted either Scottish Water or Business Stream.

We found no evidence that Business Stream's investigation into the complaint was inadequate. The works had been inspected by a site agent, and it was clear that the area of work was on the supply side of Mr C's water meter, meaning that any water lost at this point would not have passed through the meter or affected its reading.