First steps in an Auckland emergency
Find the water meter
Watercare says meters usually sit at the front of the section near one side boundary, in a box in the ground with a blue or black lid. In flats, one meter may serve the whole building.
Close the meter tap
The tap at the meter opens anti-clockwise, so turn it clockwise to stop the flow.
Gas smell: out first
Switch off gas appliances, leave lights and switches alone, and get outside, leaving doors and windows open. If you know where the outside meter is, a quarter turn closes its valve; Vector says it's off when the handle is horizontal to the pipe. Then ring 111 and Vector on 0800 764 764.
Sewage overflowing
Ring Watercare on (09) 442 2222, option 1, before a plumber. It checks whether the public pipe is the cause.
Then tell us the job
Use the urgent form and say what you've turned off.
What's different about urgent jobs in Auckland
Watercare after hours
Reporting online works from 6.30am to 10.30pm Monday to Friday and 7am to 5pm on Saturday and Sunday. At any other time, phone (09) 442 2222 and choose 1.
Outage, or your pipes?
No water at all can be a network fault, so check Watercare's current outages first. Its targets for an unplanned outage are a response inside two hours and water back inside five. If an outage goes beyond five hours, it supplies bottled water or sets up a tanker or hydrant close by.
Vector's gas crew
Vector aims to have a crew at a reported gas leak within the hour. Its technicians aren't gasfitters, so once the network is safe, repairs to your pipes or appliances go to an authorised gasfitter.
Some jobs skip Watercare
Watercare points you straight to a plumber or drainlayer when a septic tank overflows, a tap won't turn off, or groundwater won't drain off the section.
Your side of the meter or Watercare's?
A leak in the meter or on the street side belongs to Watercare, and water escaping before it reaches the meter doesn't show up on your bill. From the meter outlet to the house, the pipes are yours, so a burst there is a job for your own plumber.
Watercare's crews won't repair private pipes, even if you offer to pay, because of liability. Tenants should tell the landlord straight away, since landlords are responsible for leaks on their property.
Licences don't switch off at night
Whoever arrives should be able to show a current PGDB licence, either the card or the app version. Check it's for the right trade, since plumbers, gasfitters and drainlayers hold different licences.
Urgent building work can start without a consent when there's no practical way to get one first and life, health or property is at risk. Where the job would ordinarily have required consent, the owner must afterwards seek a certificate of acceptance from Auckland Council. Get the after-hours rate explained before the tools come out.
What we would do
Open your meter box this weekend and check the tap turns, so you're not hunting for it in the dark. In a real emergency, stop the water or step away from the gas first; very little gets worse once the supply is off. Make the Watercare call for anything involving sewage, and keep a few days of drinking water at home. When it's safe, tell us what happened and an Auckland tradie who does urgent work can pick it up.