South East Water restores supply to homes in Kent and Sussex after week of chaos

Water is finally being restored to some homes across Kent and Sussex - after almost a week of chaos.

Some 6,500 homes will have their taps running again after a gruelling six days of disruption - which has prompted fury towards provider South East Water (SEW).

The firm blames the outage - which has affected 30,000 homes since Saturday - on Storm Goretti bursting pipes and cutting power.

It has prompted a probe by water regulator Ofwat - with hundreds still experiencing low water pressure.

The beleaguered water firm has faced heavy criticism from MPs and the public as the outage came off the back of a similar incident last month, when 24,000 homes were affected.

A major incident was declared by SEW and Kent County Council on Monday, but not by either East or West Sussex County Councils.

On Friday, SEW's incident manager Mathew Dean said: "Water supplies have now been restored to the 6,500 properties in Tunbridge Wells area.

"Some customers may be experiencing low pressure as the water levels continue to build this morning throughout the area's pipeline network.

"Continuous supplies have been restored to the town after we implemented our recovery plan which involved keeping local booster pumps switched off for 36 hours so our drinking water storage tank could fill.

"We are very sorry to every single one of our customers who have been affected.

"We know and understand how difficult going without water for such a long period of time is and how difficult it makes everyday life." sfgdg

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Earlier this week Sky News spoke to elderly residents who were affected.

One said: "I cant believe we're here now and we haven't got any water.

"I cannot remember anything being like this - in the war we didn't have this.

"You're never clean - everything you touch is dirty. It's awful."

Ofwat's investigation will look into whether the supplier had breached its licence condition by failing to comply with customer service standards obligations and offering appropriate support to affected customers.

If the regulator decides SEW has breached the conditions it could be stripped of its licence.

South East Water Limited reported an increase in pre-tax profit to £18.2 million for the six months up to 30 September 2025, up from £2.6 million in the same period last year.

In the village of Bidborough, Kent, there are still are 320 homes still affected by low water levels.

Bottled water sites will still remain open today "as a precaution", the company has said.

(c) Sky News 2026: South East Water restores supply to homes in Kent and Sussex after week of chaos