[Lee GLS]

You can get water from an area that veolia doent supply, or a commercial supplier of pure water. You can then clean in the veolia area from your van with WFP

[johnwillan]

Good news

Update from Veolia Water to be published this Thursday.

Any business in existence prior to March 15th 2012 whose sole income depends on the cleaning of domestic windows, walls, patios or private motor vehicles are exempt from the restriction until July 4th 2012 at which point it will be under review.

Hope this helps.

John

[Window Washers]

its going to rain everyday in april and may and then they will say they have to much water

[andyM]

Good news

Update from Veolia Water to be published this Thursday.

Any business in existence prior to March 15th 2012 whose sole income depends on the cleaning of domestic windows, walls, patios or private motor vehicles are exempt from the restriction until July 4th 2012 at which point it will be under review.
Hope this helps.

John

I wonder what has caused them to do that?
Did any of you in the Veolia area get your local MP involved?

[johnwillan]

Yes I did, I also requested the help of the FSB (Federation of Smalll Business), FWC etc, I think Craig Mowlams letter from the BWCA was very good. I can only assume the change of heart was in response to information received and formal requests for exemption.

Had they not relented I would have seriously considered challenging them in court.

Anyway it's good news for now, but not over yet.

[andyM]

Good man. 

[Roger Oakley]

And East Surrey & Sutton water gave us the all clear today also

[Cliff perkins]

I thought there were posts earlier saying we was all ok as we run a bussiness.
So in short we are all stuffed if a hosepipe ban comes into play in your area.
Well surely they cant stop you earning a living.

[Roger Oakley]

Hose-pipe ban is coming into play in the South East 5th April make no mistake there, you did need to put your case across to add weight to the original restrictions that most of the SE water companies had on their websites. A few of us on here did just that.

[johnwillan]

It's a little complicated, the answer is yes & yes. Each company is legally entitled to apply the act (regulations) as they see fit however they do try and show a united front. The issue we encountered with Veolia is that they decided to take a completely different stance to the five other companies and restrict any company using a hosepipe on domestic premises. They even went as far as to say the Health and Safety exemption could only apply to cause not use.

I think the act does not intend to restrict businesses working on domestic premises but it is not clear hence the problems we have encountered.

It would be good if the act could be changed to clarify this point otherwise we may have to go through this each time, god forbid.

[Roger Oakley]

John
And that is why you had to put your representations forward by last week to get your case across.
Veolia took a hard line, and which from what you are saying common sense has prevailed and they have changed their stance.

[Londoner]

Thats extremely good work there. Well done everybody. Award yourself a pat on the back.

[dd]

Very good news. Thanks for the update John.

[johnwillan]

Here is the official publication which as you can see is not such good news.

Published today in two national papers and the Veolia Water website:

We are window cleaning business, are we affected?
Yes. However if your business was in existence before 15 March 2012 and your income is solely dependent on this activity, we will make an exception until 23:59 on 4 July 2012. During this time we are requesting that businesses ensure that at the end of the time period they can operate under the restrictions.

To summarise, they have given us a three month reprieve after which they will restrict the use of WFP, Pressure Washers etc. on domestic properties by service providers effectively destroying the livelihoods of many small businesses.

This would appear to be in contradiction to their peers at Anglian, Southern, South East & Thames Water.

I will continue to fight our cause with the assistance of the FWC, BWCA, FSB and our local MP.

I will keep you posted.

 
John

[Roger Oakley]

John,
I'm the same s you, but fighting the pressure washing side, not great news.
I haven't heard anything personally other then East Surrey & Sutton water.
Veiola seem to have taken the hard line here which is not good at the end of the day.

[Paul Coleman]

if it happens we should all get together like the lorry drivers a few years ago and do a rolling blockade protest 100's of signwritten(or not) wfp vans!  

I'm up for a day off to show the barstewards and blockade their workplace along with other vans - wherever it may be.  I'm not in their area either.  They need to be shown the extent of feeling about this or other areas may try it on too.

EDIT:  I've just read further down the thread about a temporary reprieve.  A dry Summer and we will be back on this in July.

[britishwill]

Thank you very much for a sterling effort John

[Roger Oakley]

For anyone that is interested Thames Water have now updated their web-site with the new exemptions which is fairly good news, it does give us (pressure washing) the all clear to carry-on.

[Mick White]

hi
just had letter from Veolia anyone who was in Business before the 14 March 2012 can carry on using wfp for another 3 months.

it should be on they website by now.