Our Guaranteed Standards

• When we make an appointment with you, we’ll offer you either a morning appointment (before 12pm) or an afternoon appointment (after 12pm).
• You can ask for an appointment within a two-hour time frame that suits you.
• If we need to change your appointment, we’ll give you at least 24 hours’ notice.

	If we do not book the appointment correctly, for example: we fail to specify a morning or afternoon slot; we don’t attend the appointment; or we cancel with less than 24 hours’ notice; we’ll pay you £20 (or credit this amount to your account).
We will pay you within 10 working days. If we do not pay you within this time, you can claim a further £35 by contacting us within three months. If you cancel or miss the appointment, you will not be eligible to receive any payment under this standard.

• We’ll reply to any written queries about your account within five working days from the date we receive your letter or email.
• If we fail to meet this standard, we’ll pay you £20 (or credit this amount to your account).
• We will pay you within 10 working days. If we do not pay you within this time, you can claim a further £35 by contacting us within three months.

You won’t be eligible to receive any payment under this standard if your query is made out of spite, or you tell us that you don’t want to follow up your query.

If you ask us for a receipt for a payment you have made, we’ll send it to you within five working days. If you ask us for a copy of a bill, we’ll send it to you within five working days. If you move out of your property we’ll send you a final bill within five working days of you telling us that you’ve moved (as long as you have taken a meter reading on the day you moved out, or you’re happy for us to use an estimated reading).

• If you write to us asking to change your payment method and we cannot do this, we’ll tell you within five working days of receiving your letter.
• If we do not pay you within this time, we’ll pay you £35 (or credit this amount to your account).
• We will pay you within 10 working days. If we do not pay you within this time, you can claim a further £35 by contacting us within three months.

We’ll respond to all written complaints within five working days from the date we receive your letter or email. If we do not respond to you within this time, we’ll pay you £35 (or credit this amount to your account). We will pay you within 10 working days. If we do not pay you within this time, you can claim a further £35 by contacting us within three months.

You won’t be eligible to receive any payment under this standard if your complaint is made out of spite, or you tell us that you don’t want to follow up your complaint.

Occasionally we may need to turn off your water supply to carry out essential, planned work.

• If we need to interrupt your water supply for more than four hours, we’ll give you at least 48 hours’ notice. We’ll also let you know when we expect to turn your water back on.
• If we fail to give you notice about planned work, or your water supply is not back on by the time we gave you, we’ll automatically pay you £20 (£50 for business customers).
• If we do not pay you within 20 working days of the date your water supply was interrupted, we may pay you an additional £20 (£50 for business customers). However, in some cases we may not know that the supply to your property was interrupted. In these cases, you will need to contact us to claim your payment.

If your supply turns off unexpectedly, for example due to a burst main, we’ll aim to get your supply back on within 12 hours of when we became aware of the problem, except in exceptional circumstances. If we can’t get your supply back on within 12 hours, we’ll automatically pay you £30 (£75 for business customers). For each additional period of 12 hours where we do not fix the supply, we’ll pay you an additional £30 (£75 for business customers). We’ll aim to let you know where supplies will be restricted, where you can get an alternative supply of water, if this applies, and who you should contact for more information.

We will not pay you compensation if the burst main has been caused by third-party damage.

Flooding from water mains

• If your property is flooded as a result of a burst water main, we’ll pay you £30.

Internal flooding

• If sewage from our sewers enters your home, or passes beneath a suspended floor, the first time this happens we‘ll automatically cancel or refund your yearly sewerage charges. After this, each time flooding happens we will pay you the amount of your yearly sewerage charges.
• We’ll work out any future payments by looking at your water use from the previous year, and calculating the amount you must pay based on this year’s prices. There is a limit of £1,000 for each payment we make under this standard.
• If we don’t pay you automatically within 20 working days of the flooding, we’ll pay you an additional £20 (£50 for business customers).
• We will disinfect the area affected and try to help with removing sewage debris.

External flooding

• We will pay you compensation if water escapes from our sewers and enters your garden, and you let us know at the time. The amount we may pay you will depend on the type and amount of flood damage.
• We may make more than one payment in a year, and you can claim up to half of your annual sewerage charges (from a minimum payment of £75, up to a maximum of £500).
• If we don’t pay you automatically within 20 working days of the flooding, we’ll pay you an additional £20 (£50 for business customers).
• We will disinfect the area affected and try to help with removing sewage debris.

• If we make a mistake when handling a payment by direct debit or standing order, we will refund you (as long as you can provide proof of any bank charges or financial loss).

• If a court claim is made against you for not paying your bills, and this is due to a mistake or oversight that we have made, we will pay you £100.

• If there is damage to your property as a result of discoloured water, we will pay you compensation.
• You must send all claims to us in writing. We will decide how much compensation we pay you based on the type and amount of damage.
• When we pay the cost of replacing damaged parts of your property, the damaged goods will become our property.

• We are not required by law to make a payment if we fail to meet a guaranteed standard because of circumstances outside our reasonable control. This includes extreme weather conditions, strikes, third-party actions, or acts of customer negligence (recklessness or carelessness).
• If you owe us money and more than six weeks have passed since the payment was due, we will use any amount you are owed in compensation under this scheme to reduce the amount you owe us.
• Your rights to take legal action as a result of loss or damage are not affected by payments we make to you under this scheme.
• By paying you any amount of money under this scheme, we are not accepting or admitting that we are at fault.
• If you have a dispute with us about your right to a payment, please follow our complaints procedure. You can read this on our website at www.iwnl.co.uk/how-to-make-a-complaint/