Protecting your water and the environment

You can find information about the water quality in your area by entering your postcode here.  

Water quality in England and Wales is regulated by the Drinking Water Inspectorate (DWI). It makes sure all water companies supply safe drinking water that meets legal standards.

To ensure the water Independent Water Networks Ltd (IWNL) provide our customers is wholly compliant with the Water Supply (Water Quality) Regulations 2016 and all other amendments, we regularly monitor water quality on all our networks. This involves collection of regulatory drinking water samples from our customers’ taps throughout the year. Therefore, you may get a visit from one of our team to collect a sample and complete a water fittings inspection (see Plumbing and water fittings regulations for more information). The results from these samples are shared with the DWI.

The DWI produces detailed reports, sharing every water company’s sample results and the conclusions of any audits or assessments. These reports, and other information on drinking-water quality, are available on the DWI’s website.

For more information on discoloured and cloudy water, or to take a quick look through our useful guide on how to save water in your home, please visit our help and advice section. Help and advice

Plumbing and water fittings regulations

The Water Supply (Water Fittings) Regulations 1999 and Water Byelaws 2000, Scotland, aim to protect public health, safeguard water supplies, and promote the efficient use of water within customers’ homes and businesses across the UK. They set legal requirements for design, installation, operation and maintenance of plumbing systems, water fittings and water-using appliances.

Owners, occupiers and anyone who installs plumbing systems or water fittings have a legal duty to ensure that their water systems comply with the Water Fittings Regulations. To find out more information you can view the Water Supply (Water Fittings) Regulations here.

For any plumbing work in your home, we recommend choosing an approved plumber. This will give you confidence that the work is of a high standard and will protect the quality of your drinking water. Find an approved plumber.

 

WaterSafe

Network locations

Plant Enquiries – IWNL owns and operates water networks across England, Scotland and Wales. We run a fully automated online system so requests for asset record drawings (to view our network locations) can be made as and when required. You can take a look at this here.

Variations of Appointment – Inset Licences are granted to Independent Water Networks by Ofwat under the Water Industry Act 1991 to be the water and/or sewerage provider.

IWNL inset notices

Water resources

IWNL continuously works with all water companies which provide us with a bulk supply of water, to protect against a growing risk of drought and water shortages, due to a changing climate and a growing population  IWNL’s Drought Plan

Every five years we also produce our Water Resources Management Plan (WRMP) which looks at how we’ll keep your taps running whilst keeping bills affordable. Download Five Year Water Resource Management Plan. We also produce an annual review of our plan to ensure that the it remains fit for purpose. IWNL’s Water Resources Management Plan here. 

More help and advice

Infographic of a house showing the water main, the pipe inside the boundary of the property is labelled as the customers responsibility, and the pipe outside the boundary is labelled as IWNLs responsibility

Responsibility for pipework

It is important to know where your responsibility lies for the pipework in and around your home.

You are responsible for maintaining all of your internal pipework and the supply pipe up to the boundary of your property. We will maintain the water main and equipment up to the boundary of your property.

Find out more 

IWNL water property searches

The official CON29DW Drainage and Water Enquiry offers homebuyers complete peace of mind by identifying all the risks that a property may face in relation to the ownership and location of sewers and water mains. If you need help in identifying the location of existing water mains and sewers, you can get this information from a property search.

IWNL has its own property searches team. They can carry out an asset location search, which provides information on the location of known IWNL clean and/or wastewater assets, including details of pipe sizes, direction of flow and depth. Please note that there is a charge for this service.

CON29DW application

To find out more information or to apply for a search, please login into your IWNL account to complete our Online Application.

Alternatively, please download our CON29 Information and Application Form.

Application form