Thames Water Leak Map: How to Read It

Where to find the map and how to get pins to show

Go to the Report a problem section of the Thames Water website and choose View current issues, the option described as checking whether they already know about the problem. The map that opens covers the whole Thames Water supply area, from Oxfordshire across to London, and at that scale it shows nothing at all. That catches most people out.

Type an address, a postcode or a case number into the search box at the top, or use the location button to jump to where you are standing. Then press the plus button once or twice. Issues only load when you are zoomed in to street level, so if the map looks empty, zoom in before deciding nobody has reported the leak.

The case number search is the useful part if you reported the leak yourself. Every report gets a reference, and typing it in takes you straight to that pin, even if you are nowhere near it.

Clean-water leaks only appear where Thames Water supplies the drinking water. Parts of outer London are supplied by Affinity Water, SES Water or Essex & Suffolk Water, and a leak there will not appear, however long it has been running. Your water bill names your supplier.

What the different pins mean

The map mixes several kinds of work, and the label on each pin tells you which one you are looking at. Only some of them are leaks.

• Leak: a visible leak someone has reported on a main or a communication pipe in the street or footpath
• No water / Low pressure: a supply problem affecting a group of homes, often caused by a burst nearby
• Planned maintenance and Planned improvements: booked work such as main replacement or new pipes, with start and end dates
• Blockage, Sewer flooding and Broken/missing cover: the wastewater side, which is a separate team

Water coming up in the road next to a smell of gas is not a map job. Keep people back, keep flames and anything that could spark away, and call the National Gas Emergency Service on 0800 111 999.

Reading the five leak statuses

Tap a leak pin and a panel opens with the street, a reference number, the date the leak was first reported, a short note on what happens next and a progress bar in five segments. The label next to the bar is the current status.

Reported means a report has come in and nobody has been out yet. Under investigation means someone is checking there is a leak and judge how serious it is. If it is confirmed, the job moves to Repair planning, which is often the longest wait. Thames Water ranks repairs by how much water is being lost, how customers are affected, how complicated the dig is and where it is. A road closure or temporary traffic lights need the council’s agreement, so a leak on a busy road can sit at this stage while a quiet side-street leak overtakes it.

Repair underway means a crew is digging. Near gas mains and other services, crews sometimes dig by hand, which is slower. Repair complete means the pipe is fixed, but the road surface is often made good afterwards, so a cone and fresh tarmac can hang around for a few days more.

For planned work the panel shows start and end dates, what is being done, how many days a week the crew is on site and any traffic arrangement, such as priority signs or temporary lights. Each job carries a reference number, and a Get in touch link at the bottom of the panel if you need more detail than the map gives.

The leak is not on the map: report it, and check it is not yours

If the leak is missing, report it through the same service with Report new problem. You move the map to drop a pin where the water is, then describe what you can see and how bad it is. Adding a photo helps them grade it. Our guide to reporting a leak to Thames Water covers the phone and WhatsApp routes as well.

Before you report, look closely at where the water surfaces. Water pooling after heavy rain is often just surface water, so check again in a dry spell. Water rising around a small stop tap or meter cover at the edge of a front garden, or a soggy patch on the lawn in dry weather, may be your own supply pipe rather than the main. The pipe from the boundary into your house is yours, and a leak there never appears on the map as a Thames Water job. The pipe responsibility guide sets out where that line falls.

Anyone on a meter can check this in half an hour. Close the inside stopcock, read the meter, wait 30 minutes without using water and read it again. If it has moved, water is escaping between the meter and your stopcock. Reading a water meter shows you which digits to watch.

When the leak turns out to be yours

Once Thames Water confirms a leak on your supply pipe, you are expected to have it repaired within four weeks. If it is not fixed in that time, Thames Water says it can use its powers under Section 75 of the Water Industry Act 1991 to carry out the repair and charge you for it, and in an emergency it may turn off your supply until the leak is fixed. On a meter you also pay for every litre that escapes until it is fixed, though Thames Water offers a leak allowance, subject to its terms, if the leak is repaired within the four weeks and you claim within three months.

On a private supply pipe the plumber’s first job is to stop the flow at the boundary stop tap or the inside stopcock, then find where the pipe has failed. In older London houses that is often an old lead or iron pipe, or a joint where new plastic pipe meets old metal. A short exposed section can be cut out and joined with a fitting rated for burial. A long corroded run is better replaced, which usually means digging or moling under the path and is a planned job rather than an emergency one.

For water that is running now and cannot be stopped at the stopcock, book an emergency leak repair. You pay the £60 call-out and the repair price is agreed with you on site before any work starts. As a guide to the wider market, a single underground joint repair is often a few hundred pounds, and a full supply pipe replacement across a front garden commonly runs into four figures depending on length and what has to be lifted.