A HASLEMERE man has won a battle against Thames Water over a leak. 

Geoffrey Cheetham was first made aware of a leak in early October when a Thames Water representative came to his house in Tennyson’s Lane. The leak was located in Chase Lane, Haslemere and Geoffrey’s pipes were said to be the cause. Geoffrey called out an emergency plumber who located the leaking pipe, which was the responsibility of Thames Water. 

Geoffrey said: “Thames Water clearly couldn’t be bothered to get someone out to check it. The leak had clearly not been located by the man who had visited because there was no sign of it on the verge and my Thames Water visitor had sought merely to blame us. It’s a disgrace.”

Despite sending evidence to Thames Water, Geoffrey received “a second threatening demand from Thames Water telling me that I would be liable for monthly payments of circa £3,500”. Geoffrey repeatedly contacted Thames Water as well as the joint CEOs of the company, Jeremy Hunt, the CEO of Ofwat and the Herald.

MP Jeremy Hunt intervened on Geoffrey’s behalf after receiving a letter from him and the leak was finally fixed. Geoffrey said: “It took just two hours to confirm and fix the issue – just two hours after weeks of angst and trouble.” 

The Chancellor asked the water company to investigate the leak near Mr Cheetham’s property. He said: “I was very pleased that Thames Water then sent an engineer out to assess the situation properly and I hope this is all now resolved.”

A Thames Water spokesperson said they were “sorry to hear that Mr Cheetham has been impacted by a leak at his home” and that the company “is working closely with him to establish the cause of the leak and to resolve the matter”.

They added: “We’re committed to finding and fixing leaks and repair more than 1,000 a week – that’s one every ten minutes.”