Multi-site business water in Scotland in 2026

Every non-household customer in Scotland has been able to choose its provider since April 2008, and that covers businesses of any size, charities and public bodies. Scottish Water acts as wholesaler to every licensed provider and doesn’t deal with business customers directly except in emergencies.

Each premises has its own supply points. WICS notes that water and sewerage usually sit under two separate Supply Point Identification Numbers (SPIDs), so an estate of ten shops could easily have twenty supply points between them. You can choose different providers for water and sewerage, but most multi-site businesses keep everything with one so there’s a single invoice run and one contact.

The WICS Code of Practice sets service standards for signed-up providers on contracts, transfers and complaints. It doesn’t contain specific commitments for multi-site customers, so it pays to ask each provider directly:

• whether it can put every site on one consolidated invoice with a site-by-site breakdown
• how it delivers billing data, for example as a spreadsheet you can load into your own systems
• whether you’ll have a named contact for the account
• how it handles sites joining or leaving the estate part way through a contract

Write those questions into your request for quotes, so every provider answers the same ones.

A provider can quote each site from its address and SPID. For an estate, a simple table does the job.

Our guide on finding your SPID explains where each number appears.

A few situations come up again and again on Scottish estates. Empty units still pay, since Scotland’s vacant property exemption ended in April 2017. A unit where the landlord pays for water can still have its own drainage charge if the assessor has rated it separately, for example in a shopping centre or office block. And a site that’s connected but never registered for charges is a gap site, which Scottish Water writes to separately.

Start the list with the sites you’re sure of, then chase the gaps one by one.

Property drainage is charged on rateable value (RV), and Scottish Water says it can apply even where a site has no water supply. Unmeasured water and sewerage charges use RV too. So when RVs move, an estate’s bill moves with them.

The 2026 revaluation took effect on 1 April 2026, based on rental values at 1 April 2025. Across Scotland, the Scottish Government’s figures show total RV rose by 10.86%. Sectors moved very differently. Hotels rose by 27%, public houses by around 14%, and cafés and restaurants by 7%.

Here’s what that means on a bill

This example is illustrative. A retailer pays £10,000 a year in drainage across its Scottish shops. If its RVs rose in line with the 10.86% national figure and the rate per pound of RV stayed the same, that would add about £1,086 a year. A hotel group with RVs up 27% would feel a much bigger change.

Two checks are worth running site by site. First, does each site actually drain surface water to the public sewer? Our Scottish drainage guide covers when the charge can be challenged. Second, should any unmeasured site have a meter? Scottish Water’s charges scheme says it’ll meter an existing unmeasured supply at no additional charge when a provider asks, unless fitting one is impractical or the cost is excessive. You can’t go back to unmeasured once a meter is in, so compare the RV-based charge with likely metered use before you ask.

Scotland and England run separate business water markets. Scotland’s opened in 2008, with WICS as regulator and the Central Market Agency keeping the register of supply points. England’s opened in April 2017, regulated by Ofwat with MOSL as market operator. Ofwat describes the English market as working alongside Scotland’s.

That has a few practical effects for a group with sites on both sides of the border:

• English sites are served by different regional wholesalers, so their wholesale charges differ by area, while every Scottish site shares one
• Scottish sites need a provider holding a WICS licence, and English sites need one licensed to trade in England
• complaint routes differ, and in Scotland the final stage is the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman

Some providers trade in both markets and can quote the whole estate together, even if the paperwork ends up as two contracts. Others focus on one side. When we run a combined comparison, we ask each provider on the panel which sites it can take, then show you the Scottish and English sites side by side. Our guide to multi-site business water covers the English side in more detail.

Charities and community amateur sports clubs can apply to the Scottish Government exemption scheme, which Scottish Water runs. Applications go through your provider for each premises every year, with renewals due by 31 March. Full exemption applies where gross annual income is under £200,000, and a 50% discount applies from £200,000 to £299,999.99.

For charities with many sites, the details matter. Some premises are excluded regardless of income, such as charity shops, space let out or used as a holiday let, and cafés open to the public for more than 20 hours a week. Umbrella organisations registered as one charity can find the combined income puts them over the threshold. Scottish Water’s scheme policy says they may still qualify for parts of the group if they can show audited income for each part and get written confirmation from the Scottish Government.

Local authorities and arm’s-length external organisations are excluded from the scheme. Like other public bodies, they can still choose their provider, and most will buy through their own procurement rules. We can supply a like-for-like comparison to support that process.

Because the wholesale charges are identical whichever provider wins, a tender for Scottish water is really a tender for retail fees, billing and service. A sensible order looks like this.

1. Finish the site list. Every address with its water and sewerage SPIDs, and the contract end date for each.
2. Line up the end dates. Sites often sit on different contracts. Under the Code of Practice, an early termination fee can’t exceed the discount received in the current term, so it’s worth checking whether bringing a site in early costs anything at all.
3. Set the questions. Consolidated billing, data format, account contact, how trade effluent consents are administered, and whether the provider can arrange data loggers through Scottish Water’s accredited installers.
4. Compare like for like. Ask for the retail fee and billing basis per site, with the wholesale charge shown separately.
5. Check the contract. Renewal notice terms, the cooling-off period and how sites are added or removed.

If your sites have trade effluent consents, our guide to Scottish manufacturing explains how consents are handled when you change provider.

We’d take your site addresses and SPIDs, match water and sewerage supply points for every premises, and flag any that look empty, unmeasured or charged for drainage they might not need. For charities, we’d note which sites hold an exemption. Then we’d ask our panel of licensed retailers to quote for the whole estate, with the wholesale charges set out once and each provider’s retail fee, billing basis and terms underneath. Scottish tariffs are explained in our 2026/27 tariffs guide.

Want a quote? An address and SPID are enough to compare business water suppliers.