Residents were left without running water and heating for five days, despite the housing association which owns their flats knowing about a leak for more than a week.

Richmond Housing Partnership (RHP), which rents flats in Queens House, in Little Queens Road, Teddington, was alerted to a leak in the underground water system on Monday, February 6.

Water had to be shut off for a number of hours on Friday, February 10, and service was supposed to resume that day.

But three sets of residents, including a disabled woman, were left without water until Tuesday, February 14, and another - a mum-of-two - has still not had her service resumed.

A Thames Water investigation found a problem with underground air locks, and although it was RHP’s responsibility, the company repaired it on Monday as a “gesture of goodwill”.

Thames Water explained to RHP that the repair of that particular underground water system was RHP’s responsibility alone.

Queens House resident John Stephens said while his water returned a few hours after Thames Water's maintenance work, one of his neighbours is still without water or heating.

Mr Stephens said: "One of RHP's customers will be without water for a whole week tomorrow (Friday, February 17).

"She's got two kids in the house. She hasn't had water all week.

"Another, a disabled lady, was left without water over the weekend."

RHP left bottles of water outside residents’ doors to “ensure customers had water to last them throughout the weekend”.

Housing associations such as RHP are organisations which provide “low-cost social housing”. Richmond Council transferred all its social rented housing stock to RHP in 2000.

Teddington ward councillor Stephen Knight criticised RHP for leaving residents without basic amenities for so long, as well as being unhelpful when he attempted to make contact.

Cllr Knight said: “With RHP we, as a council, struggle to get anything out of them these days.

“They wouldn’t let me speak with the person who was dealing with this – and customer services wouldn’t even give me their email address. They just said if I emailed them they could pass it on.

“As councillors that’s not what we’re used to.”

The housing association said it was sorry to hear of Cllr Knight’s experience.

It said: “Our senior employees are always happy to speak to Councillors and would be very happy to speak with them still to answer any questions they might have.”

RHP also said it attempted to contact all affected residents, and it left messages on its website and social media profiles.

A Thames Water spokeswoman said: “We immediately investigated why the flats had no water and found it to be due to a leak on a pipe which falls within the property boundary, so not on our pipe.

“We did however repair it as a gesture of goodwill as we didn’t want the customers to be left without water.

“We understand at least one flat has ongoing issues with an airlock, which the property owner is responsible for fixing, and we understand Richmond Housing Partnership is addressing this.”