JEDDAH: The National Water Company (NWC) has offered free checkups for leakage, in a measure to calm citizens after an increased number of complaints against the company.

The company announced that the initiative will offer a free checkup for internal leakage to more than 10,000 houses with high consumption in Riyadh. The move comes after the water and electricity minister had accused citizens of large consumption, leading to high water bills.

The NWC explained that once a leak is detected, the customer shall be provided with a report about leakage points, repair solutions and guidelines for reducing consumption.

The company said in a statement on Wednesday that the company will re-read the meter after making sure that the beneficiary has fixed the leakage to calculate the actual consumption and deduct it from the bill, adjusting the customer’s invoice accordingly.

The company had previously implemented an initiative to study potential leaks in 80,000 houses suffering from high water consumption. The study showed that 30 percent of houses had leakages. After repairs were carried out, 18 million cubic meters of water per annum was saved, equal to the average consumption of 24,000 houses a year.

The company added that its technical teams will contact customers to set up appointments and then inspect six main locations that might be the major source of house leaks — the connection between the meter and the tank; the ground tank; toilets and kitchen; the roof tank; descending pipelines; and garden and swimming pool pipelines (if applicable).

The NWC noted that the issued technical report has to be approved by the customer after detection of any leak. The report should consist of additional information such as the number of occupants; area and type of building; type of vegetation and method of irrigation (if applicable); swimming pool(s), its area and method to fill it; and the number of desert coolers (if any).

The company explained that it is continuously assessing the leakage of more than 400 clients with large consumption bills every month.