We are working hard to resolve the ongoing Ulcombe drinking water supply issues, specifically the low pressure and intermittent supplies on Windmill Hill, Knowle Hill and Ulcombe Hill.

What are we doing now?

• Windmill Hill area: Continue to tanker water directly to the 10 affected properties on Windmill Hill. These actions are having a positive impact and these customers remain in supply. While tankering is not a sustainable long-term solution, it will continue for as long as required.
  

• Ulcombe Hill: A further nine residential properties on Ulcombe Hill are currently in supply, but may continue to experience low pressure or temporary loss of water during peak demand periods. Whilst there are no easy fixes here, our engineering team are urgently exploring what permanent measures can be put in place to remedy these longstanding issues.
  

• Church Farm: We are supporting the farm by tankering 30,000 litres of water daily directly to their onsite tank and delivering bottled water to those who live on the property.
  

• Bottled water: For those customers still receiving intermittent supply in Ulcombe, we will continue to contact them to arrange bottled water deliveries, as necessary.

We know the above isn't a long-term solution but, until we have identified the best course of action, we will continue to do this.

Our technicians are reviewing all valve operations locally, ensuring that everything is operating as it should and, importantly, helping to identify any local issues which may be causing the interruptions customers are experiencing.

This work is undertaken at night when the network is quietest i.e. when the least number of customers are using water. This makes the investigation more accurate and will yield better results.

If residents do ask about our staff working in the area, we're very happy for you to confirm what they are doing. But, we ask all residents to remain respectful if speaking with members of our team as their safety is incredibly important.

What are we doing in the longer term?

Our priority right now is to identify and implement all the immediate solutions we can to alleviate the issues being experienced in Ulcombe as quickly as possible. But, alongside this, our modelling and engineering teams are working hard to identify the long-term solutions to these problems.

In our latest business plan, there are engineering schemes earmarked for this area, and we will look to understand the specific benefits to Ulcombe from these. Once we have the findings of our initial investigation and better understand the short and long-term solutions required.

I hope this email gives you confidence that we're taking this issue deeply seriously and we apologise sincerely for the disruption and inconvenience this situation continues to cause residents. We know this isn't acceptable, and are working very hard to rectify this.

Kind regards,

Matthew Dean

Incident Manager