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SES Water has no hosepipe ban and no restriction of any kind recorded. You can use a hosepipe and a sprinkler as normal. The SES Water supply area across east Surrey and parts of south London, Kent and West Sussex. SES Water supplies 750,000 people.
Confirmed from SES Water's own site on 25 July 2026, which carries the customer notice: 'We're aware that South East Water has recently announced a hosepipe ban. Currently, SES Water are not planning to introduce a hosepipe ban.' That distinction matters in RH, CR, DA, SM, KT and GU, where SES Water shares postcode districts with companies that DO have a ban. Formerly Sutton and East Surrey Water; the two names refer to the same company.
No hosepipe ban applies. You can use a hosepipe and sprinkler as normal.
We are an unofficial tracker, so SES Water’s own notice is the version that legally applies to you.
SES Water supplies 750,000 people across east Surrey and parts of south London, Kent and West Sussex, in a compact area that is almost entirely surrounded by companies with a different position. It is a water-only company, formerly Sutton and East Surrey Water, and the two names refer to the same business.
The overlap problem here is acute. SES Water shares the RH, CR, DA, SM, KT and GU postcode districts with South East Water and Southern Water, both of which have used statutory restrictions this season, and with Thames Water. So in this corner of the South East a postcode is close to useless as an answer, and a household can be a few hundred metres from a neighbour under a legal restriction while facing none itself.
Source: SES Water
The reason this company diverges from its neighbours is its source mix. About 85 per cent of SES Water's supply comes from groundwater, which recharges over the winter, with the remaining 15 per cent from Bough Beech reservoir. Its published position is that resources recharged well at the start of winter and that it went into the summer in a relatively healthy position, and it says access to those groundwater sources has kept it clear of hosepipe restrictions for over twenty years.
It follows that what would change this is a dry winter rather than a hot summer. A chalk aquifer that fails to recharge between November and March shows up in the following July, the opposite timescale from a surface-reservoir company. When South East Water announced its restriction, SES Water published a notice distinguishing itself from it.
Source: SES Water
A Temporary Use Ban restricts a narrower set of things than most people expect, and it is worth knowing which before one is ever declared. Section 76(2) of the Water Industry Act 1991 lists eleven uses, starting with watering a garden, cleaning a private motor vehicle, watering plants on domestic or other non-commercial premises, cleaning a private leisure boat and running through pools, ponds, fountains, walls, windows, paths and patios.
A watering can, a bucket and water you have collected yourself are never restricted by a Temporary Use Ban. Indoor use is never restricted, and neither is non-mains water. SES Water would publish its own concessions on top of that list, and those are where the practical answers live: turf, drip irrigation, Blue Badge and trade use are handled company by company.
More: what you can still do, newly laid turf, drip irrigation, business and trade rules.
If a Temporary Use Ban were in force here, breaching it would be a criminal offence. The maximum is level 3 on the standard scale, currently £1,000, under section 76(5) of the Water Industry Act 1991. It is not a fixed penalty: SES Water cannot issue one and would have to prosecute. In practice companies publish an enforcement policy that starts with a warning, so a first breach realistically produces a letter.
SES Water's own account is that it has avoided hosepipe restrictions for more than twenty years, which spans the 2005 to 2006 South East drought, the 2011 to 2012 drought and the dry summers of 2018 and 2022, all of which produced restrictions elsewhere in the region. For a supply area sitting between two companies that have restricted use this season, that is the single most useful fact on the page, and it is a consequence of the source mix rather than of milder local weather.
Source: SES Water
No. SES Water has no hosepipe ban and no restriction of any kind in force.
It could. A company can impose a Temporary Use Ban under section 76 of the Water Industry Act 1991 without the regulator's permission, so this can change within days. For SES Water it turns on its own drought plan.
Yes, both. No Temporary Use Ban applies in the SES Water area, so hosepipes, sprinklers and pressure washers are all allowed.
Up to 1,000 pounds, imposed by a magistrates' court on conviction under section 76 of the Water Industry Act 1991. It is not a fixed penalty: SES Water would have to prosecute, and starts with a warning.
Usually, but not automatically everywhere. Most companies exempt Priority Services Register customers and Blue Badge holders who cannot reasonably use a can or bucket, some automatically and some on registration. SES Water's own notice sets the wording.
Your water bill, on the water supply line rather than the sewerage line: in much of England and Wales those are two different companies. SES Water supplies the ses water supply area across east surrey and parts of south london, kent and west sussex.
No. They are separate companies with similar names and adjacent supply areas, and SES Water published a customer notice specifically to make that clear when South East Water announced its restriction. SES Water was formerly Sutton and East Surrey Water.
Because about 85 per cent of its water comes from groundwater that recharges over winter, with only 15 per cent from Bough Beech reservoir. The company says that source mix has kept its supply steady through dry spells and has kept it clear of restrictions for over twenty years.
The supply area covers east Surrey including Redhill, Reigate and Dorking, parts of south London around Sutton and Croydon, and slivers of Kent and West Sussex, bounded by Thames Water, South East Water and Southern Water.
6 outward postcode districts resolve to SES Water here, as primary supplier or as one candidate among several. An outward code is the part before the space: SO14, not SO14 3AB.
Source: SES Water
SES Water publishes water quality data openly but does not include a hardness determinand in any edition. We have asked them for it in writing. In the meantime their own customer pages are the place to check.
Source of record: SES Water’s own status page, last checked 16 September 2026. We do not publish a hosepipe ban on the strength of a news report; every status rests on a primary source.