Who is responsible for the head of sewer run?

[macadonald]

Hi Guys,

I was under the assumption that as I have sewer pipes at the back of my house and under where the extension will be built, that I would need Thames Water build over permission. A colleague at work, who is familiar with domestic building practices for insurance purposes, said that although he wasn't certain, he thought that as we were the head of the sewer run, i.e. our section is not shared, that we owned it and may not need build over permission?

Any ideas?

 

[PaulJR]

It's been a few years since I worked in that field, but the decider under the 1991 act was that a sewer serving more than one property was deemed public.

If you ring Thames Water and ask to speak to someone in Network Sewers, they will have at least one person employed specifically to sort this sort of thing, and they will be able to tell you pretty much immediately if you need a build over agreement or not.

TBH the agreement is just that - it means you understand that if push comes to shove, your floor gets dug up, it makes no difference to how you build, the local BC inspector will want exactly the same detail as the Water Authority would.

 

[freddiemercurystwin]

Yes only drains that are used by more than one resident are shared. So yours are not Thames Water's responsibility. Didn't you read the leaflet? http://www.thameswater.co.uk/cps/rde/xbcr/corp/private-sewers-leaflet-june_-2011.pdf

 

[noseall]

This is correct.

I too own a house that is at the head of the drain run so i don't share any drains on my property and I am free to work on them as i please (within B.C. constraints of course).

There could be non-shared drain runs that are owned by water companies (i.e. not privately owned) so that may need looking at.

 

[^woody^]

Unless the drain is in fact a public sewer, and under the ownership of the authority in the first place

 

[macadonald]

Thanks guys, I phoned the number on the brochure, which no I never read and they confirmed what Woody said about not needing build over permission as the sewers are not being shared.

Saves me some money. This and the discovery yesterday that the existing bit of extension that I need to remove only has a raft floor slab with no foundations, is a good start.