NI Water charges and what a leak costs
NI Water does not charge households for domestic water at all, so a domestic leak in Northern Ireland does not change a bill by any amount. The water is still lost and the pipe is still somebody's to repair.
Last reviewed 14 August 2026. Rates correct as of 1 April 2026
The short answer
There is no domestic water charge here at all, so there is no figure to multiply a leaked volume by. The cost of a leak is not zero because the calculation came out at zero. It is that domestic customers are not billed for water.
The volume, the severity and the next action are unaffected, and they are the half of the question that still has an answer. Water escaping under pressure still has to go somewhere.
How this works in practice
The calculators on this site still run, and they still report the rate of loss, the daily volume, the annual volume, the severity and what to do next. Only the cost is suppressed, in its usual position, with the reason in place of the figure.
That is a deliberate choice over showing nothing at all. measure the rate of loss at the meter anyway sets out why an unmetered household should still measure a leak.
What changes the answer
The rate is only one of the things that decides what a leak here costs.
- Whether the property is metered. A metered household here does pay a volumetric rate, so the same leak has a cost.
- The charging year. Rates and standing charges are reset annually, so a bill can rise because of a price change and a leak at the same time.
None of this changes the volume of water lost, which is the same figure in every supply area in the country. It changes only what that volume costs.
Assumptions and sources
Drip Calculator: how much water does a leaking faucet waste?
United States Geological Survey, Water Science School · primary source
- Faucet drip volume, adopted: 0.25 ml
- Faucet drip volume, measured range: 0.2 to 0.33 ml
- Bath tap drip volume: 0.5 ml
- Drips per US gallon: 15140 drips
- Drips per litre: 4000 drips
The pharmacopoeial metric drop, 20 drops to 1 millilitre
United States Pharmacopeia, British Pharmacopoeia and European Pharmacopoeia convention · primary-standard source
- Standard drop volume: 0.05 ml
Tate's law: the weight of a falling drop
Thomas Tate, Philosophical Magazine, 1864, with the later drop-weight literature · primary source
- Drop weight: W = 2 * pi * r * gamma equation
Plumbers shine the spotlight on dripping taps during Water Saving Week
WaterSafe, with Waterwise · untraceable source
- Claimed annual waste from a dripping tap: 5500 litres per year
International Organization of Legal Metrology · primary-standard source
- MPE, accuracy class 2, lower zone Q1 to Q2: 5 %
- MPE, accuracy class 2, upper zone Q2 to Q4: 2 %
- MPE, accuracy class 1, lower zone: 3 %
- MPE, accuracy class 1, upper zone: 1 %
- In-service MPE multiplier: 2 ratio
- Q2 / Q1: 1.6 ratio
- Q4 / Q3: 1.25 ratio
Aquadis+ DN15 and DN20 specification sheet
Itron · manufacturer source
- Q1 minimum flow rate, DN15, Q3 2.5, R160: 15.6 l/h
- Q2 transitional flow rate, DN15, Q3 2.5, R160: 25 l/h
- Q3 permanent flow rate, DN15: 2500 l/h
- Typical starting flow rate, DN15: 0.4 l/h
- Typical starting flow rate, DN20: 2 l/h
- Q1 minimum flow rate, DN20, Q3 4.0, R160: 25 l/h
- Flow rate at which accuracy is within +/- 5%, DN15: 3 l/h
- Flow rate at which accuracy is within +/- 2%, DN15: 5 l/h
- Minimum scale interval, DN15 and DN20: 0.02 l
Water resources 2024 to 2025: analysis of the water industry's annual water resources performance
Environment Agency · primary source
- Household per capita consumption: 136.5 l/person/day
- Household per capita consumption, prior year: 137 l/person/day
- Household per capita consumption, dry-year adjusted: 140.3 l/person/day
- National leakage: 2617 Ml/day
- National leakage as share of water put into supply: 19 %
PR24 common performance commitments: per capita consumption (PCC), version 2.1
Ofwat · primary-standard source
- PCC formula: (measured household consumption + unmeasured household consumption) / total household population l/person/day
Leaky loos, why it's not as simple as faulty flush valves
ech2o, reporting research attributed to Thames Water · secondary source
- Toilets inspected: 58551 toilets
- Toilets found leaking: 4854 toilets
- Prevalence: 8.3 %
- Average residential leak rate: 400 l/day
- Average commercial leak rate: 2100 l/day
- UK-wide average across all WCs, leaking and sound: 20 l/day
- Share of leaking toilets with flush valves rather than siphons: 81 %
Waterwise · untraceable source
- Single leaking toilet: 215 to 400 l/day
- Share of toilets leaking: 5 to 8 %
- UK total from leaking toilets: 400000000 l/day
Methods for Calculation of Evaporation from Swimming Pools and Other Water Surfaces
M. M. Shah, ASHRAE Transactions SE-14-001 · primary source
- Outdoor unoccupied pool evaporation: E0 = (C1 + C2 * u) * (pw - pa) / ifg kg/(m2*h)
- C1, SI: 235 constant
- C2, SI: 206 constant
Location-specific long-term averages, Wisley, Surrey
Met Office · primary source
- Annual mean daily maximum temperature: 15.41 degrees C
- Annual mean daily minimum temperature: 6.66 degrees C
- Annual rainfall: 667.92 mm
- Annual mean wind speed at 10 m: 5.06 knots
Discover Water, the water industry transparency site run with Water UK, Ofwat, CCW, the Drinking Water Inspectorate and Defra · primary source
- Average annual household bill, combined water and sewerage: 639 GBP
- Average annual household bill, water only: 309 GBP
- Average annual household bill, sewerage only: 330 GBP
SI Brochure: The International System of Units (SI), 9th edition (2019), version 4.01, June 2026
Bureau International des Poids et Mesures · primary-standard source
- cubic metre: coherent derived unit of the SI, Table 5 m3
- litre: non-SI unit, Table 8. 1 l = 1 L = 1 dm3 = 10^-3 m3 l or L
- bar: non-SI unit, Table 8. 1 bar = 0.1 MPa = 10^5 Pa bar
Authority URLs for the named entities in content/entities.ts
Various, see per-entity notes · primary source
WC flush volume: three UK instruments, not one
UK Statutory Instruments, Northern Ireland Statutory Rules, and Scottish Water · primary-standard source
- Maximum single flush, all three jurisdictions: 6 litres
- Dual flush, lesser flush maximum: two-thirds of the largest flush volume ratio
- England and Wales transitional maximum, 1 Jul 1999 to 1 Jan 2001: 7.5 litres
Per-event central heating top-up volume, derived
Derived by Q3 from Boyle's law and typical UK domestic expansion vessel specifications · derived source
- Water held in an expansion vessel: V_water = V * (1 - P0 / P), pressures absolute equation
- Typical top-up, 8 l vessel at 1.0 bar pre-charge, 0.5 to 1.5 bar: 1.6 litres
- Typical top-up, 8 l vessel at 0.75 bar pre-charge, 0.5 to 1.5 bar: 2.4 litres
- Typical top-up, 12 l vessel at 1.0 bar pre-charge, 0.8 to 1.5 bar: 2.4 litres
- Typical top-up, 8 l vessel at 1.0 bar pre-charge, 1.2 to 1.5 bar: 0.9 litres
- Realistic range: 0.9 to 2.5 litres
Monodispersed Bubble Generation Using Hydrophobic Orifices: The Extended Tate’s Law
Bo Liu, Hao Zhang and co-authors, ACS Omega 2024, 9(17), 18854 to 18861 · primary source
No rate on this page has been verified yet. The record exists, the source it will be read from is recorded, and until somebody has read it the page shows a notice rather than a number. A wrong rate is worse than a missing one.
The licensed appointee for this supply area is recorded as Northern Ireland Water Limited. That is who holds the appointment, which is not always the name on the rate card, and it does not determine what you pay.
What to do next
Two things, and neither depends on being charged for the water.
- Measure the loss anyway. The volume is real whether or not it is billed, and where the water is going is the part that causes expense.
- Check who is responsible for the pipe. Responsibility follows the boundary rather than the charging arrangement, so a leak that costs you nothing can still be yours to repair.
Common questions
- Why does this page not show an NI Water rate?
- Because no rate on this site has been verified yet. Every one of the 22 supply area records shows a notice instead of a figure, and will keep doing so until the rate has been read from the company's own charges scheme. A wrong rate is worse than a missing one.
- Does a leak cost a Northern Irish household anything?
- Not on a water bill, because domestic water is not charged to households. The loss is still real and the pipe is still somebody's to repair.
- Is the licensed company the same as the one on my bill?
- The appointment for this supply area is held by Northern Ireland Water Limited. That can be a different name from the one on the rate card, because four supply areas publish their own charges while sitting inside a larger licensed group. The rate you pay is set by the charges scheme for the area.