Cleaning up after a flood

Floods can cause damage to your property and leave dangerous mess and debris in or around your home. Here’s how you can get it cleaned up safely, what you can do and how we can help.

Helping you clean up

If the flood has been caused by the public sewerage network then, once the flooding has gone down, we’ll usually be able to help you begin cleaning up.

You should contact your insurer if the flooding was caused by a problem with a private drain.

We can

We won’t do anything that could risk further damage or contamination of your home or belongings.

This could include things like removing water where access to an area of the property is restricted.

We cannot

You should contact your insurer to get help with repairs, replacement items and alternative accommodation.

Cleaning your home

Sewer flooding debris contains human waste including poo, wee and other unhygienic, unpleasant items.

We strongly recommend that you get professional cleaners who can deal with flooding clean-ups to do the cleaning for you. 

Cleaning up after a flood can be dangerous and unpleasant work. The debris left behind by sewer flooding contains lots of germs, bacteria, pathogens and viruses that could make you ill.

If you can’t use professionals and you need to clean up yourself, you should:

If you start to feel unwell at any point during or after cleaning up the flood debris, contact your doctor and tell them about the flooding, how you’ve cleaned up and your symptoms.