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Episode 24 – Part 1 – An Overview of Off-Mains Drainage in the UK with James Warren, UKDP
44 Plays2 years ago
In this week's episode, we are speaking with James Warren from UK Drainage Professionals!
Across the three parts of this episode, we are discussing everything off-mains drainage, the basics, the legislation, and the key things to look out for.
James is incredibly passionate about off-mains drainage, its impact on the environment, and helping people to really understand a quite complicated and less common topic. James has an enthusiasm that you can't help get energised by.
James's experience has been gained in both the insurance and drainage industries. He started his career working in claims management for the UK’s largest insurer, before moving into the drainage industry in which he had the opportunity to combine both skills. James is our expert on anything from repair scopes to assessing insurance cover.
In Part 1 of this episode, we start with an overview of off-mains drainage:
🏘️ How many properties are off-mains drainage in the UK
🪣 The differences and costs of septic tanks and sewerage treatment
⚖️ Who is responsible for reporting on drainage in a property sale
💦 Complexities of maintenance with shared off-mains drainage or drainage located on third party land
🌍 The potential environmental impacts of off-mains drainage
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Transcript
Introduction and Guest Overview
00:00:00
Speaker
Welcome to Survey Booker Sessions. Tune in to hear from people working in a range of industries and roles to provide you ideas that you can take away and use in your own business. I'm your host, Matt Nally, the founder and director of Survey Booker, which is the leading CRM and survey management system for surveyors. On this week's episode, we have James, who's the technical director of UK Drainage Professionals. So thank you for coming on. Absolute pleasure. Thank you for having me. For anyone that doesn't know you, do you want to give us a background as to sort of who you are, what you do, and then we can go from there?
00:00:29
Speaker
Yeah, of course. I'll make this as short and sweet as possible. It's not much of an illustrious career, but it's a quirky one. So yeah, so I'm a technical director of UKDP, UK drainage professionals. We are a specialist off-mains drainage company, so we focus predominantly on drainage systems that are not connected to the main sewage systems.
00:00:52
Speaker
Yeah, we work nationally, have lots of engineers and repair crews, and we just try and make sure that the environment is being protected by making sure the correct product is inserted in the ground and following all the correct regulations. It almost sounds as if that's scripted, but it's not. Good elevator pitch, I like it. Thank you. Perfect. I suppose there's a few topics we want to cover today.
Understanding Off-Mains Drainage
00:01:15
Speaker
The first one, I suppose, would make sense to cover, I suppose, an overview of off-main drainage. So do you want to start with,
00:01:20
Speaker
what it is how many properties are affected all that type of stuff absolutely so in a weird way because it's given so little focus we have to work in reverse so when we look at the potential numbers that are off mains or off grid as it's sometimes referred
00:01:35
Speaker
We have to look at the only resource, which is the ONS, about 96% they state of property stock, housing stock, is connected to the main sewage system. So in default, about 4% isn't. So that roughly translates to a million properties in the UK that have their own off-mainage drainage system, their own private drainage system. And at the moment, those options are either a septic tank, a sewage treatment plant,
00:02:05
Speaker
or a cesspit. So all normally contained within the property boundary, sometimes not, but we can go into that, but it affects really, yes, the customer will not be paying sewerage rates, but they will be paying for the maintenance and upkeep of their own private drainage system.
00:02:23
Speaker
Interesting. Okay. And is it, does it affect both residential and commercial properties or predominantly a residential issue? It is predominantly residential. Yes. You can get, you know, when you're talking about off mains, it is predominantly rural and semi-rural settings. So yes, you can have commercial properties on off mains drainage systems, but the absolute vast majority of what we do is residential.
00:02:47
Speaker
Whether that's individual dwellings, which is quite a common affair, a group of properties on a shared system. I think the most we've ever had is about 20-ish properties sharing a system like this. Although we're working in one at the moment, which is a complete estate in Peterborough, which is about 55 properties onto a huge treatment works.
00:03:08
Speaker
But typically we're talking small residential, domestic, one, two or three properties. That's kind of the norm, the smaller scale of things, the bread and butter. Definitely. And you mentioned there were a few different types of offerings drainage.
Types of Drainage Systems and Selection Criteria
00:03:22
Speaker
So why might one be used over another? Is it down to sort of location? Is it down to the volume of? That is a brilliant question. And I knew you'd have brilliant questions. It's really down to
00:03:34
Speaker
whether the ground is suitable to have a SoCo installed, so whether the ground is permeable and whether it's able to dissipate the water that might be leaving the back end of a septic tank. It might be that there's not enough room to put in a certain system. It may be that the ground is really bad. There's lots of parameters and characteristics that have to be sort of thrown in the mix as early as possible. If you're looking at a new build, there needs to be a lot of due diligence
00:04:03
Speaker
Where's the nearest main sewer? Are there any water courses? But if we're replacing an old system with a modern day system, it's really a case of where is this system going to discharge? Oh, or can it discharge anywhere? If the ground is awful, if it's clay and it's not going to dissipate any water,
00:04:22
Speaker
If there's no water courses anywhere, if there's no mainsour anywhere, it may be that your only option is to install a cesspit, which is effectively just a bloody great holding tank that has no exit, there's no outlet to it, it just takes the wastewater from the property, fills up, you need to empty it with a vacuum tanker, suck it all out, and then that process repeats. You need to empty that eight times-ish a year. It gets mega expensive,
00:04:48
Speaker
It's a perfectly legal provision of drainage, but it really is a last resort. So it's all about looking at the immediate surrounding area, checking the ground conditions and then tracking back to see which system will suit that site.
Financial and Environmental Considerations
00:05:02
Speaker
I know it's going to vary massively depending on the type of thing you install, but in terms of like having the clearances, if you have a cesspit or even if you're installing different things, how long will they last as well?
00:05:18
Speaker
Yeah, that, yeah, brilliant question again. I mean, if we're looking, let's say a typical three or four bed property, if we're not having to dig, because the depth of the installation is governed by the depth of the pipe work that's already at the property. So effectively, if we're looking at an average installation with the pipe works that say half a meter deep, you can put a septic tank in a drainage field, which is a modern day soakway. You can get that in the ground for easily 10,000 pounds.
00:05:48
Speaker
If you want to upgrade that to a sewage treatment plant where it's going to cost you more to buy the product, it's going to have electricians cost on top of it. The drainage field can be smaller. It's a bit boring, but I can explain why later. You're probably looking at 12, 13, 14,000 pounds for the sewage treatment plant and the drainage field. But if you've got to go for a cesspit, even though it's the most rudimental product because it's just a big tank, they're huge. They're absolutely huge. So you're probably looking at
00:06:18
Speaker
at least 15 to 20,000 pounds to get that in the ground. But that gives you no treatment. There's no soakway on the back end. And it's the worst option for the environment because if ever there's a structural breach on that cesspit, you've got that waste going straight to ground. It's going to hit an aquifer, find a surface water, and it's a quick way to pollute. But yeah, all three options are legal. Most expensive is the worst option, which is the cesspit. But then if you've got no option and you have to have some legal provision of drainage, you have to have that.
00:06:48
Speaker
A septic tank is great because there's no electricity charge and the sewage treatment plant gives you the best treated effluent so it's better for the environment but you're looking at a few thousand pounds more than going for a septic tank. Most of the manufacturers give anything from a 12 month to a 25 year life warranty on the asset itself on the shell and they normally give two to three years if there's any inner workings, any moving parts, compressors, stuff like that.
00:07:16
Speaker
But you would be disappointed if they didn't last 30 40 years because they're glass reinforced plastic They're normally eight mil thick they're built to last and if they're installed correctly They shouldn't move when they're installed so that yeah, they should be good for decades
00:07:31
Speaker
Awesome. Okay.
Challenges with Boundaries and Shared Systems
00:07:33
Speaker
So then one thing you touched on a moment ago was the issue of location. So sometimes obviously these are quite big. So what causes it to sometimes not be within the boundary of a property? Is it like historical changes in boundary or is it just happening at size? The most common one we see is perhaps a septic tank is just inside the customer's boundary line.
00:07:54
Speaker
But because the original land was, say, farmland, and they've just sold off segments over the years, exactly that, there's boundary changes.
00:08:04
Speaker
The soakway might be on third-party land and the septic tank is on private land, but it all used to be one piece of land, so it didn't matter. But as you say, as boundaries change historically, that can change. Sometimes if you have a shared system, you might have three properties in a row and the septic tank has to be on one of those three. It can't stagger all three properties.
00:08:25
Speaker
So you'll have one poor property that has this set detank in their back garden, for example. And the other two, they will just have manholes and pipework under their property. They won't have any physical assets inside the cartilage of theirs. So it all depends on the dynamic. As you said, the history of the boundaries changing. But it sometimes can get really tricky. And I could bore you to tears with this, the amount of times we get involved.
00:08:51
Speaker
where there's an easement for perhaps a soak away that's on third party land. The soak away fails for whatever reason, it's come to the end of its life, tractors gone over the pipe, whatever it might be. But the easement will always have a specific physical footprint.
00:09:07
Speaker
So an old soakway might be a rubble pit, just backfilled with brickwork and stones and what have you, where a modern soakway has to be perforated pipe and a series of pipework, which will absolutely be bigger than the soakway footprint. So that easement has to change. And there's no requirement from the third party owner to agree to that easement being changed to accommodate the larger drainage field. Then you've got to look at an inboundary solution
00:09:37
Speaker
And that means it might have to be bespoke because typically you haven't got much room to play with. So that can cause a hell of an issue because if you go bespoke, it normally means you're going expensive. So just because you think, oh, I could just throw a brand new soak away in, it's not that straightforward. But these are the complexities that no one knows about, very few people care about, unless you are directly involved and then you have to care.
Management and Responsibility Issues
00:10:03
Speaker
We'll come on to the why is it not well owned in a minute, but my only other question on that then is, I suppose if it's just a single property running off that off main drainage, it's slightly simpler even if you've got the boundary issue, you can still deal with it yourself. If it's a shared one, how does that typically get managed between different parties? Do they tend to have some sort of a leasehold effectively or sync fund or something that they pay into to help maintain that or can that get complicated? It can get very complicated because
00:10:32
Speaker
It's very rare that there's a written agreement between the shared parties.
00:10:36
Speaker
What typically happens is that the property owners have been there for many years. They've always agreed to just pay a third of the emptying. Typically, you're only looking at, say, 150 to 200 pounds a year for one septic tank empty, even if it's a big shared system. So if you split that three or four ways, or equally, depends on how many shared parties you have, it's not a great deal of cost. The only issue comes into play if a property is sold,
00:11:02
Speaker
Someone doesn't have the tank on their land. They say well, it's a verbal agreement. I'm not happy with that I'm a single person using this system. You're all families. I want to pay less even though that's not how it works people They like to introduce their own logic on these things and that can cause a real issue so you're absolutely right any shared scenario should have it formally written in my opinion and
00:11:27
Speaker
It works beautifully when there's a residence association, and this just forms part of that agreement under the heading of that association. But that is so rare. In the last few years, I can remember literally one or two that have had formal agreement set up. Where it's set up, it's beautiful. It's so easy. You refer back to a certain paragraph and everyone has to agree. Where it's just a verbal historic agreement,
00:11:55
Speaker
it can get super messy. So you just have to try and play. Sometimes we feel like peacemakers or, or some sort of dispute resolution on but, but that's what you need. Even though it's just drainage, it can cause like crazy emotions between neighbors. But yes, if, if I had my, if I had my wish written formal agreements between all shared systems, absolutely.
Role of Professionals in Home Buying Process
00:12:18
Speaker
I suppose then in terms of the, we'll come on to why is it not one there in a minute, but who's responsible then in the home buying process, for example, for flagging this up? Is it the surveyor to pick it up on a survey or considering not maybe every property gets a survey, is it up for the conveyancer to pick up on or is it a mix? It's a great question again. It's a great question.
00:12:40
Speaker
If you go to, I know we're going to touch on the governance and the general binding rules, it does actually stipulate that the operator, which is I, the asset owner, the property owner, should make the purchaser aware of what the system is, how it's maintained, and who maintains it. That's actually part of the regulatory reform. So it should start with the vendor.
00:13:03
Speaker
But of course, the surveyor has to grade the drainage system, they have to identify it. So you could say it's on them as well. So as the ultimate, the ultimate stopper is the conveyancer. But when and also what is the estate agent part of that process as well, you know, there's in a seller's packet in the questionnaire, all of these things should be flagged up. You know, who has ultimate responsibility?
00:13:29
Speaker
It's a brilliant question. Speaking to advances, they will probably say themselves.
00:13:34
Speaker
But from my personal experience of being directly and indirectly involved in PI claims, the buck seems to stop with the surveyor if they haven't picked up on it. So I don't know the actual answers to that. I can only speak from firsthand experience where conveyances are typically saying they're the final safety net, but I only see any comeback, any negativity towards the building surveyor. Yeah, it's a bit of a quirky one.
00:14:03
Speaker
I will come on to a bit more of that in a moment, but I suppose my final question around this slide of things is, why is off-mains drainage not known
Awareness and Implications of Off-Mains Drainage
00:14:11
Speaker
that well? Is it purely because it's such a, I say it's a small percentage of properties, it's a large number in real terms that are affected. So why is it not that well known?
00:14:21
Speaker
I wish I knew, I wish I knew. I suppose, yeah, so it is roughly one in 20 properties are off main. So yes, not huge, but when you, it is a million properties, give or take, it might be fractionally more now. I don't really know in England, where there's a,
00:14:38
Speaker
the largest percentage of these, there is no database for them. So in default, there's no ability for communication from DEFRA, the Environment Agency, any other governing body who may have some impact, any stakeholder who has impact on these systems.
00:14:57
Speaker
The, the only asset owners that are on the radar the environment agency or the property owners that need to have permission for a discharger consent to discharge. So a tiny proportion of those in England will be on the radar.
00:15:14
Speaker
Yeah, I don't know. I think sometimes with drainage, I've been told this for my whole 25 years in the drainage industry. Unfortunately, that out of sight, out of my mentality is so true. And with off-main drainage systems, you might enjoy three or four decades trouble free.
00:15:31
Speaker
So it's only gonna become a problem when you have an issue, when you can't flush the loo, if there's some nasty odors, something as fundamentally rudimental as that. But yeah, because it is such a tiny proportion of the overall housing stock, it doesn't seem to get any press, which I find ridiculous because from an insurance perspective, we're involved in insurance claims of these things. You might look at an average claim value for say 800 pounds for a drainage system
00:15:58
Speaker
on main systems connected to the series system, but the average price is 13 to 15,000 for an off mains training system.
00:16:06
Speaker
So yes, they're a tiny proportion, but it's a flip side on the ratio when it comes to the cost of putting them right. So you would have assumed that they should get more press because they're more damaging to the environment when they go wrong. They're a lot more expensive than normal drainage systems when they go wrong. And there's a lot of specific governance over it, but still, excuse me, still they're, I don't know. They're just, it's just not sexy. It's not glamorous.
00:16:32
Speaker
And I don't know how two gorgeous chaps like ourselves, if we can't make it more publicly aware, then I don't know who will. But we're going to give it a good look. Awesome. Well, I think tune in for part two and we'll look at compliance and governance.