Lo people
Since I moved into a new house a few weeks ago, it's been clear the water use is too high.
I took a water meter reading on day one, and then a water company bloke took one two weeks later and my house has literally poured water down the drain.
Bearing in mind all water bill usage, equates to an identical waste water volume reading/ useage reading, so while waste water use is a cheaper rate, still...using a lot of water costs you twice.
The water meter fitted in the driveway is notably new.... it looks new and the reading is very low. Perhaps the previous owner complained of a leak? Perhaps the water bills were so high the meter was changed as a precaution.
It's things like this you can't easily check when you buy a house.
Luckily a bloke like me knows exactly my annual use from the previous house and with a similar size, same occupants, and not watering the garden as it's Oct/Nov, the first bill after only 3 weeks was like a nuclear explosion in my house.
And what it all boils down too is the stupid modern toilet cistern flushing systems, that are quieter and smaller allowing smaller cisterns, (but which wear out, in my experience, in about 4 years) Long gone are the old flush systems, with huge pluger levels and mammoth washers holding back the tide of the flush ...... now we have the ridiculous little plastic diaphram'd cistern systems.
In my old house I changed them all at least twice in 12 years.
Test 1 - after your toilet hasn't been flushed for an hour, take a piece of toilet tissue, fold it into 1/4's so it's rigid, and hold it on the back of the toilet bowl at the top, about 5 cm below the rim.
It should only pick up the dampness from any residual water. If it drenches, and if another piece of toilet tissue drenches, you have water pouring down the back of the toilet constantly. We don't have "over flows" any more, that pour out into the garden via a pipe. We have water invisible trickling down the bog. It's noticable as a chalk build up in hard water areas too.
Test 2: With the cistern full, string the ball cock that stops water coming in, up tight. So no water can can fill the tank.
Then time to see how long it takes to empty.
In my case, it was 7 minutes.
7 minutes to drain about 4 litres of water.......
go figure the water bill. That's over 800 litres per DAY ... doing nothing.
I had them all changed yesterday, and now the water meter needs not spin like a helicopter under the driveway.....