Manholes/Inspection chambers in private garden

Melitha

Hello,
Can anyone advise what to do about manholes/rain collectors placed by builder in the back garden.
We have purchased a newly built off the plan house in 2019. During snagging we noticed the 2 manholes and raised question on numerous occasion with builder. However we did not get any reply
and being under presure to sign off we went ahead with purchase.

Now a year later we are building a shed in this area (as it's the only suitable place) and we encounter difficulty as they are in the way and not only this but depending on whether sometimes there is a stale smell in the garden comming from them.
Also we discovered that one of them does not serve my dwelling but it's used by my neighbours and I feel it shouldn't be on my property.

Would like to know if possible to have this moved out of the garden and also who's responsible in doing this.

Goldengirl

Melitha wrote: »

Hello,
Can anyone advise what to do about manholes/rain collectors placed by builder in the back garden.
We have purchased a newly built off the plan house in 2019. During snagging we noticed the 2 manholes and raised question on numerous occasion with builder. However we did not get any reply
and being under presure to sign off we went ahead with purchase.

Now a year later we are building a shed in this area (as it's the only suitable place) and we encounter difficulty as they are in the way and not only this but depending on whether sometimes there is a stale smell in the garden comming from them.
Also we discovered that one of them does not serve my dwelling but it's used by my neighbours and I feel it shouldn't be on my property.

Would like to know if possible to have this moved out of the garden and also who's responsible in doing this.

Private drains are the owners responsibility until they join a public sewer owned now by Irish Water.
Unfortunately Irish Water will not take any responsibility for drains/ shared private drains/manhole covers on your property. Your surveyor or solicitor should have mentioned this when you bought. You are responsible for them, as is your neighbour , but moving them to your neighbours garden would be an issue now , and I don't think they will agree to it . Or indeed that they have to .
If they become blocked any neighbours served by these drains should stump up the money with you to get them fixed unblocked.
However in reality nobody gives a sxxt , excuse the pun , as the issue is not in their own garden .
I order to move them you will have to get planning permission from the council, IrishWater will have to be consulted, and also the neighbours, I would imagine ,but not 100% sure about that .

Melitha

Goldengirl wrote: »

Private drains are the owners responsibility until they join a public sewer owned now by Irish Water.
Unfortunately Irish Water will not take any responsibility for drains/ shared private drains/manhole covers on your property. Your surveyor or solicitor should have mentioned this when you bought. You are responsible for them, as is your neighbour , but moving them to your neighbours garden would be an issue now , and I don't think they will agree to it . Or indeed that they have to .
If they become blocked any neighbours served by these drains should stump up the money with you to get them fixed unblocked.
However in reality nobody gives a sxxt , excuse the pun , as the issue is not in their own garden .
I order to move them you will have to get planning permission from the council, IrishWater will have to be consulted, and also the neighbours, I would imagine ,but not 100% sure about that .

Hi , thanks for the info. Our solicitor mentioned this to the builder but they didn't give any answers and because week's have pased and we had to sign or lose deposit we went ahead. So we basically I felt pressured &cornered by constructor in going ahead before all questions answered.

If it makes you feel any better, we have two in our garden. They've been there 30+ years and no one has ever come to look at them, nor have they ever caused an issue.

ELM327

Can you block them?

Effects

ELM327 wrote: »

Can you block them?

Why would you do that? 

Irish Water: Niamh

Hi Melitha,

Melitha wrote: »

Hello,
Can anyone advise what to do about manholes/rain collectors  placed by builder in the back garden.  
We have purchased a newly built off the plan house in 2019. During snagging we noticed the 2 manholes and raised question on numerous occasion with builder. However we did not get any reply
and being under presure to sign off we went ahead with purchase.

Now a year later we are building a shed in this area (as it's the only suitable place) and we encounter difficulty as they are in the way and not only this but depending on whether sometimes there is a stale smell in the garden comming from them.
Also we discovered that one of them does not serve my dwelling but it's used by my neighbours and I feel it shouldn't be on my property.

Would like to know if possible to have this moved out of the garden and also who's responsible in doing this.

Irish Water is responsible for the public water and wastewater network.

If you have an Irish Water asset on your site, we would advise that you email the details of your query and the approximate location of our asset to diversions@water.ie.

For more information concerning the diversion or alteration of Irish Water assets, please see here.

If these manholes are part of a shared private network, this would be a private matter between yourself and your neighbours.

I hope this information helps.

Kind regards,
Niamh

ELM327

Effects wrote: »

ELM327 wrote: »

Can you block them?

Why would you do that? 

Because they are on your property?

Melitha

ELM327 wrote: »

Can you block them?

Don't think I can do that, in case they need access to inspect.

ELM327

Melitha wrote: »

ELM327 wrote: »

Can you block them?

Don't think I can do that, in case they need access to inspect.

Did they have a wayleave on your property for access when you purchased it (your solicitor should have shown this on the folio)
If not, then there's no reason to grant them a right of way for access without remuneration.

Melitha

ELM327 wrote: »

Did they have a wayleave on your property for access when you purchased it (your solicitor should have shown this on the folio)
If not, then there's no reason to grant them a right of way for access without remuneration.

Not sure, I will have to check contract and with solicitor. At the moment we are still waiting for some final paperwork. The constructor company was really hard to deal with and thus was our first experience.