New Appointments and Variations (NAVs) 

New Appointment and Variations (NAVs) are regulated companies established to offer water and / or sewerage services to a specific geographic area, replacing the incumbent water company.

NAVs are subject to the same duties and obligations as the incumbent companies.

As a NAV Albion Water can offer services in different ways; either bulk supply and / or bulk discharge or as a full service NAV allowing us to provide drinking water (either buying it wholesale or supplying it from a local resource like a borehole) and treat wastewater onsite and then discharge it locally or treat it and reuse it for irrigation and toilet flushing. This local service delivery can benefit the community and facilitate access to enhanced greenspace and biodiversity.

New appointments can be granted in these circumstances:

• The unserved criterion - an area does not contain any premises that receive services from an appointed water or sewerage company (it is ‘unserved’);  
• The large user criterion - a customer who uses (or is likely to use) at least 50 million litres of water a year (in England) or 250 million litres of water a year (in Wales) at each of its premises and wants to change their supplier in respect of those premises (a ‘large user’); or 
• The consent criterion - the existing appointed company agrees to transfer part of its area to a different company (by ‘consent’).

If a company chooses to appoint Albion Water to become the NAV for their development there is a formal process that must be followed.  The process is managed by Ofwat and takes up to 110 days, the steps are listed below:

• Identification of criteria under which the application will be made and supporting documentation gathered
• Letter of intent provided to Albion Water 
• Pre-application submitted to Ofwat (optional)
• NAV Application submitted by Albion Water to Ofwat
• Ofwat assess application
• Ofwat recommendation to Ofwat Board Committee
• Public consultation (at least 28 days)
• Albion Water to finalise negotiations with existing appointee for bulk supply/discharge (if necessary)
• Ofwat Board Committee final decision
• Appointment decision

If you would like to discuss the options for your site please contact us on 03300 580085 or complete the contact form here.