# Water pump noise from communal area due to leak in above apartment



## KingMonkey (24 Jan 2017)

I bought a new 1 bed apartment in December. It is a ground floor apartment with 3 other apartments overhead on the first and second floors.
The water pump in the communal area backs onto the bedroom in my apartment. The pump is required to pump cold water into the apartments above who don’t have enough water pressure to get the cold water otherwise. The management company recently undertook some works to the water tank in the building and since then the water pump has been constantly going off. It had not been previously going off at such a constant rate.

The constant noise of the pump is preventing me from sleeping as the noise feeds directly into my bedroom. I’ve actually had to leave my own apartment and am sleeping elsewhere at the moment because of it.

I called the management company and they sent out an independent contractor who has confirmed that the water pump in the common area is working correctly, but that there is an issue (leak) in one of the 3 apartments above causing the pump to constantly go off. The reason that the pump was not going off before was due to another fault that the recent maintenance works fixed (at the expense of the incessant noise of the pump it seems).

The management company have said that they will write to the owners / tenants in the apartments above and ask them to check their respective apartments for leaks.

Naturally I am worried as I don’t know any of the people who are living above me or how likely it is that they will respond to the management company given that they are not being affected themselves (as I said, the pump working overdrive is in the communal area on the ground floor and they can probably not hear it). If the issue is not resolved I am left with an apartment which I have just bought, but cannot live in due to the noise.

Apparently there have been similar complaints recently from other buildings in the estate.

What are my next steps here if the occupants / landlord of the apartment with the leak refuse to fix it? Do I have to go the legal route? Or do I even have any legal recourse to anyone here? I’m not sure as to who is ultimately responsible for the noise and my inability to live peacefully in my own apartment.


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## elcato (24 Jan 2017)

I don't know how the water pumps actually work but I would consider switching it off somehow every night till the people upstairs do something regarding your concerns. Do you have access to the water heater ?


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## KingMonkey (24 Jan 2017)

The water pump is behind a locked door so no access. Also I believe swithching it off is legally a no-go as the people in the apartments above are entitled to have access to water.


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## elcato (24 Jan 2017)

So the water pressure is never strong enough to get water to the apartments above ? Do you know the other people and are they owner occupiers ? If they were they could be approachable.


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## KingMonkey (25 Jan 2017)

Yes the water pressure is not strong enough. I've only just moved in so don't know anyone or whether or not they are owner occupiers.


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## Vanessa (26 Jan 2017)

I would say that the apartment leases makes provision for type of situation. Individual owners are obliged to cooperate with the management company (of which they are a shareholder) in the maintenance of the systems in the complex. Any water leak is liable in the course of time to become a bigger issue as water leaks through concrete etc. The management company is obliged to repair such leaks or require individual owners to do so


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## KingMonkey (27 Jan 2017)

Thanks Vanessa. That is somewhat re-assuring. The contractor said that if the occupants of the affected apartments don't want to fix the leaks then they're not obliged to. I think this will be a case of consistently following up with the management company until action is taken....


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