Poor quality water: how to clean it and where to complain

Complaint about lack of hot water

A number of regulations at the federal level regulate the process of supplying hot water, its quality and the relationship between the parties.

Complaint about low temperature

The standards for hot water temperature within 60-75 degrees were not invented by chance, but correspond to sanitary safety rules. Such water will serve as an additional source of disinfection, preventing the proliferation of pathogenic microflora. However, it is difficult to check this parameter by eye. In such a situation, filing a complaint follows the following algorithm:

1. Hot water is passed through for 5 minutes and collected into any container, into which a household thermometer is then lowered.
2. They contact the housing and communal services control room or the HOA with a request to send a representative to draw up a report.
3. If the representative does not appear within two hours, then the act can be drawn up independently, certified by the signatures of three witnesses.
4. Drawing up a complaint to the service organization with a copy of the report attached.

Every 3 degrees of temperature non-compliance with the standard reduces the fee by 0.1% every hour. If the water temperature is 40 degrees or lower, then you are required to recalculate according to tariffs for cold water.

Legal standards

Lack of hot water in some cases is an acceptable situation

Although the lack of hot water is an unpleasant situation for residents, in some cases this state of affairs is acceptable from a legal point of view. This is provided for by Government Decree No. 232, issued in 2021.

The document defines in detail the situations when absence is permissible, and also indicates the procedure that is mandatory in a situation where there is a need to apply additional measures.

In particular, this document states the following:

1. The total time when hot water is turned off is limited to one month. This rule states that during this period, residents can be without hot water for no more than 8 hours.
2. There is a limit on a one-time shutdown, which is 4 hours.
3. The exception is accidents that occurred on a dead-end branch of the highway. The standard time for their elimination is 24 hours.
4. In cases where the temperature of hot water drops, it is allowed to pay for it using the payment tariff for cold water. This is allowed in cases where water flowing from a hot tap is colder than 40 degrees Celsius.

In the latter case, this fact must be officially recorded. Without this condition, payment will not be reduced.

Hygienic Requirements No. 20, adopted in 2009, establish the requirements that the temperature of hot water entering the apartment must meet.

It must be at least 60 degrees and cannot exceed 75 degrees.

Quality complaint

After scheduled work or eliminating the consequences of an accident, hot but rusty water may flow from the tap. As a rule, when contacting the control room, the applicant will be informed of the reason and assured that quality will be restored within a few hours. If this does not happen, then you need to perform the following steps:

• call representatives of the service organization - the call is always recorded in a log with a registration number assigned and the date and time indicated;
• drawing up an act;
• filing a claim with the management company for recalculation.

Where and how to complain about bad water?

If the water is clearly of poor quality: for example, rusty, cloudy or has an obvious unpleasant odor, the first step is to file a complaint with the local management company. If the management company does nothing to fix the problem or ignores the complaints, the next step is the resource supply organization, for example, in Moscow it is Mosvodokanal. The organization must not only try to eliminate the problem, but also conduct a study of the drinking water and determine the cause of the contamination. If the water utility ignored the complaint or was unable to solve the problem, you should contact Rospotrebnadzor directly.

To make a formal request, you need to collect evidence and file a complaint. Evidence primarily includes photos and videos confirming that contaminated water is flowing from the tap, as well as evidence confirming the presence of an unpleasant odor. The application can be accompanied by the results of a water analysis (if one was carried out), an agreement with the management company and paid receipts for water. A single sample of the complaint itself has not been established; it can be written in free form. It is imperative to indicate the reason for the request and specific cases when contaminated or rusty water came from the tap. A citizen also has the right to demand compensation for moral damage, the cost of damaged property (if the property was damaged) and reimbursement of money spent on the purchase of bottled water.

Where should complaints be filed?

The appeal procedure rarely ends with the filing of a single petition. As a rule, restoration of justice involves sequential submission of applications to a number of authorities :

• the head of the HOA, management company, housing department;
• housing inspection;
• Rospotrebnadzor;
• prosecutor's office

When applying to the next authority, the text of the petition will need to set out the history of interaction with previous officials, attaching, if necessary, copies of correspondence.

Sample complaint to housing and communal services

Contacting a service organization with a claim is the first stage of restoring justice. In this case, it is necessary to competently draw up a complaint, reflecting not only the essence of the case, but also your legal requirements.

How to compose it correctly?

There is no unified form for a complaint, therefore, when drawing it up, the rules and regulations adopted for applications and other business papers are followed:

• the full name of the addressee and personal data of the applicant are written in the header;
• in the text of the petition, the essence is stated briefly, logically, without emotion, with reference to the violated legal acts;
• the pleading part calls for action to be taken and the perpetrators to be brought to justice;
• date and signature.

Low temperature sample

If the temperature of the water flowing from the tap is below the established standards of 60-75 degrees, then this is exactly what should be written about in the main part of the complaint, referring to the violated clauses of the Rules for the provision of utility services. The application will have the structure shown in the table.

Several options for designing the “header” regarding the addressee of the message are acceptable. One option involves only specifying the organization. According to another option, the application can be issued in the name of the head of this company. In this case, you will need to accurately indicate his position, surname and initials.

and familiarize yourself with a sample complaint about a discrepancy in hot water temperature.

Sample for absence

A complaint about the lack of hot water in the taps is drawn up similarly to the option discussed above, taking into account one nuance. In addition to the fact of lack of water, you can make a claim for late notification, violation of deadlines for repair work, unfair calculation of rent, etc.

sample complaint about lack of hot water.

Thus, if cold water comes out of the tap instead of hot water, then you need to make a complaint using the sample. The first instance for resolving a conflict situation is the organization serving the house. If the problem is not resolved, then they consistently contact the supervisory authorities designed to monitor compliance with housing legislation.

What to do if lukewarm water comes out of a hot tap?

Let's figure out how not to overpay for extra cubic meters.

– In our house there are often such cases that a little warm water runs out of the hot water tap. I measured: 30 - 40 degrees. And this happens 2-3 days every month. You have to skip it. Accordingly, we use much more hot water and overpay. I have a small child, and I fill a whole bath every day, so it costs a lot. Where can I go with this question?

The “Hygienic Requirements for Ensuring the Safety of Hot Water Supply Systems” (SanPiN 2.1.4.2496-09) sets clear requirements for the temperature of hot water: it must be no lower than 60 and no higher than 75 degrees Celsius. At the same time, another document - Decree of the Government of the Russian Federation dated May 6, 2011 No. 354 “On the provision of utility services to owners and users of premises in multi-apartment residential buildings and residential buildings” - establishes permissible deviations from these standards. So, at night - from 00:00 to 05:00 - the water temperature should not differ by more than 5 degrees, and in the daytime - from 05:00 to 00:00 - by no more than 3 degrees. It is noted that before determining the temperature, you need to run the water for some time, but no more than three minutes.

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From these requirements, according to the same resolution, the terms of payment for the services provided also follow. So, if the water temperature is below the established 60 degrees, then the payment for hot water is reduced: for every 3 degrees of deviation from the permissible deviations, the payment for hot water in that month is reduced by 0.1% for each hour of violation. If the water temperature is completely below 40 degrees, then payment for the total hours of such a violation should be made at the rate for cold water supply.

Why is hot water lukewarm?

The reasons for insufficient water temperature can be very different.

Firstly, the problem may be in your own faucet: low-quality plumbing sometimes breaks off the partitions, and instead of hot water you get lukewarm water.

Secondly, your neighbors may be to blame. So, an incorrectly installed water heater or heated towel rail can affect the water temperature in your apartment.

Another reason may be improper regulation of the water supply. Simply put, your resource supply company does not sufficiently heat the water that goes to the apartments.

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Developers who incorrectly installed the pipes, or even the pipes themselves, or rather cracks on them, growths inside or depressurization, may also be to blame.

However, there may also be external reasons. For example, your home may be the last one on the hot water line. That is, first several high-rise buildings in front of you take hot water, and only after that the water supply goes to your house. If this line is not looped, then it turns out that in such a dead-end branch the hot water cools down, or even does not warm up to the required temperature at all.

What to do?

First of all, it is worth noting that there is no point in taking measurements of the water temperature in your apartment yourself - they will not be taken into account by specialists anyway. Therefore, Andrey Vorobyov, an expert at the Public Chamber of the Kirov Region, advises immediately contacting your management company:

– We must not forget about the right of every consumer to contact his own management company; no one will do this for you. After applying, you will have to measure the water temperature and draw up a corresponding report. If the temperature is lower than permissible, then by law you will be required to recalculate.

However, the following situation may arise: if your problem with cold “hot” water is not constant, but arises only from time to time, then by the time a specialist from the management company arrives, the temperature in the tap may well be close to the standards. Therefore, Andrey Vorobyov especially notes that in this case, only installing a meter with a temperature sensor can help: such a device considers it as cold when the water temperature is below 40 degrees. Accordingly, you will not be able to overpay for pseudo-hot water.

However, if you make such a decision, you may encounter some resistance from the management company. But the maximum that they can do is express their prohibition verbally, but it will not carry any legal force.

– In 2012, the Criminal Code of the Leninsky District decided to challenge in court the decision of the prosecutor’s office, which canceled the Criminal Code’s ban on installing meters with a temperature sensor. But the court did not take the management company’s side,” says Andrey Vorobyov. “Since then, I don’t know of a single case where a management company would refuse residents to install such devices.

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If you decide to install a meter with a temperature sensor, you need to proceed as when installing a regular meter: write an application to the Criminal Code about your desire to install a new meter and indicate the desired installation date. If representatives of the management company come, they will have to put a seal and draw up a commissioning certificate. If no one shows up at the specified time, then you can install the meter yourself: the main thing is to do this in accordance with the meter’s passport, especially since in this regard it is no different from any other, so it is not so difficult to do. If no one from the management company came or contacted you about rescheduling within three days, then after 15 working days from the date of submitting the application to the Management Company, the meter is considered automatically put into operation - without certificates or sealing.

However, keep in mind that if interruptions in water temperature occur 2-3 times a month, then a meter with a temperature sensor will not help you - it simply will not pay for itself. Its installation makes sense if, due to insufficient hot water temperature, you lose at least 3 - 5 cubic meters per month.

And one more important point that also needs to be taken into account. Let's imagine a situation that all your neighbors, who are experiencing similar problems with hot water, decide to install such meters. In this case, less hot water will flow through individual hot water meters, but the indicators of the common house meter will not change. That is, all this “underheating” will go into the “heating” line and will be distributed as general house needs across all apartments. It turns out that residents will pay less for hot water and more for heating. And here the one who consumes the most hot water will save the most. And some may not save anything at all.

However, Andrey Vorobyov notes that if such a situation arises, it will be regulated at the legislative level. This was the case with general house needs for electricity, cold and hot water, when costs were transferred to the management company.

– For example, the current standard for common house needs for cold and hot water supply is 0.04 cubic meters per square meter of common property area. If you spend more, then the management company must pay the difference between the standard and actual consumption. The same scheme could be introduced for heating, says the expert.

Another solution to the problem of insufficient hot water can be a water heater. Modern equipment allows you to set and maintain the temperature you need. True, really high-quality equipment is quite expensive, and in this case it will no longer be possible to save the family budget. However, this is better than living without hot water at all. Therefore, in combination with a water meter with a temperature sensor, you can get, if not savings on the family budget, then at least the guaranteed availability of really hot water for the same money.

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Andrey Vorobyov also talks about a third option for solving the problem with hot water supply: you can approach the issue globally and start reconstructing the water supply system. In this case, you will need to hold a general meeting of residents, make an appropriate decision at it with ⅔ votes and choose an option for financing this issue: either raise additional money for the reconstruction of networks, or include their renewal in a major overhaul.

In addition, we cannot exclude the possibility that problems with hot water arise due to the management company’s desire to save money. These are especially common in the summer, when people do not use hot water as actively. Everything happens roughly according to this scenario. Housing and communal services workers shut off the valve on the riser supplying hot water so that boiler houses do not operate at a loss. At this time, the hot water supply switches to a cold flow system, and cold water flows without circulation and constant heating.

As a result, when you call a measurer to draw up a report, hot water may suddenly appear, and after a while the situation may repeat itself. In this case, it will be very, very difficult to prove that you are right.

If you suspect your management company of dishonest performance of duties, then you have a direct path to the meeting of owners - to decide on the issue of changing the management company.

And now the most important thing - briefly:

• The standard temperature of hot water is 60 - 75 degrees.
• For every 3 degrees deviation from the permissible deviations, a recalculation is required for every hour; at a water temperature below 40 degrees, it is considered according to the cold water supply tariff.
• The cause of insufficient water temperature may be your own plumbing. If everything is fine with her, you need to contact the management company.
• If you lose at least 3 - 5 cubic meters of water per month, it makes sense to install a water meter with a temperature sensor, which automatically considers water below 40 degrees as cold.
• If the problem of hot water supply in your home has external causes that do not depend on the management company, a water heater may be the solution to the problem.

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