Water Meter Spinning With Everything Off?

The meter test is the most reliable leak check there is. Water meters record flow in both directions of size, from a burst to a weep of a few litres an hour, and a small red triangle or star on the dial turns at the slightest movement. If it turns while nothing in the house is drawing water, the pipework is losing water somewhere between the meter and the furthest tap. It does not tell you where, but it does tell you how much, and that number guides everything we do next.

Where the leak sits depends a lot on the house. In the semis and bungalows around Watford, Bushey and Rickmansworth, supply pipes often run under a concrete front path and a solid hall floor, so a leak shows only at the meter. In London terraces with suspended timber floors the pipe runs through the void under the front room and can leak for months into the sub-floor. Flats fed from a communal riser can have a leak on a branch behind a bath panel or under a kitchen plinth that nobody ever sees.

On the visit we repeat the meter test properly, then isolate the house from the supply pipe at the internal stop tap to split the problem in two. Inside, we pressure test and listen with the acoustic microphone; outside, we trace the pipe route and listen along it, and use hydrogen tracer gas where the pipe is buried or plastic. The result is a marked spot, photographs and readings in a written report, and a repair through the smallest possible opening if you want it done there and then.

If the leak has caused damage inside the house, trace and access cover on most buildings insurance policies is there to pay for finding the leak and making good the way in. Our report is written for that claim. If the leak is simply wasting water outside, your water company may offer a leak allowance once it is repaired.