Service pipe

Statutory definition[edit]

The definition in section 219(1) turns on a single test: whether the pipe is subject to water pressure from the main.^[1] A pipe that would be under that pressure but for a closed valve is still a service pipe, so isolating a property does not change what the pipe is. The definition also expressly includes part of a service pipe, which is why a repaired or replaced section does not become something else.^[1] Section 219(2) extends references to a pipe to include a tunnel or conduit serving as the pipe and any accessories to it.^[1]

The definition is silent on ownership. That silence is deliberate: ownership is dealt with separately, through vesting, and the Water Supply (Water Fittings) Regulations 1999 use the vesting position to divide the service pipe into its two parts.^[2]

The two parts[edit]

A service pipe is made up of a communication pipe and a supply pipe. The Water Supply (Water Fittings) Regulations 1999 define a supply pipe as so much of any service pipe as is not vested in the water undertaker.^[2] The remainder — the length that is vested in the undertaker — is what the industry calls the communication pipe, although that term appears in neither the Act nor the Regulations.

The practical consequence is that a leak on a service pipe has no single owner. Which party is responsible depends on where along the pipe the leak sits relative to the vesting boundary, which is why leak detection on a supply pipe is usually a question of locating the leak precisely enough to establish which side of that boundary it falls on.

Connection to the main[edit]

A water undertaker has a duty under section 45 of the Water Industry Act 1991 to make a connection between a water main and a service pipe on the application of the owner or occupier of premises, subject to the conditions in that section.^[3] The undertaker carries out the connection to its own main; the pipework beyond the point that vests in the undertaker is the owner's to lay and maintain.^[3]

Section 52 places a duty on the undertaker to provide a supply of water for domestic purposes to premises connected in this way.^[4] That duty concerns the supply, not the condition of the customer's own pipework.

Scotland[edit]

The statutory framework described here is that of England and Wales. In Scotland water and sewerage services are provided by Scottish Water under the Water Industry (Scotland) Act 2002,^[5] water fittings requirements are set by the Water Supply (Water Fittings) (Scotland) Byelaws 2014,^[6] and the terminology and the ownership boundary derive from Scottish legislation rather than from the Water Industry Act 1991.