Customer Notification and Flushing Instructions

Purpose

The part of a lead service job that protects the household is the piece of paper that stays behind. A tech can identify the line correctly, control the disturbance perfectly and still leave a family drinking first-draw water out of a disturbed line, because the instruction was given verbally at the door to whoever happened to be home. This procedure guarantees the household ends up with a written notice naming what was found, a flushing instruction naming the actual taps and an actual duration, and a filter certified for the right thing, delivered to the people who drink the water and recorded as delivered.

Scope

Covers producing and delivering the written notice, the flushing instruction and the point-of-use filter for any residential or small commercial property where a lead, galvanized-requiring-replacement or lead-status-unknown service is identified or disturbed.

Does not cover identifying the material, which the Plumbing service line material verification methods SOP owns, nor the replacement itself, owned by the lead service line replacement standard. Does not cover the crew's own flushing and sampling work at the end of a replacement, which the post-replacement flushing and sampling SOP owns; this procedure produces the instruction the occupant follows afterward. Does not cover selecting or installing a permanent under-sink or whole-house treatment system, which has its own SOPs, and does not cover any statement about whether the water is safe to drink.

Roles and responsibilities

Procedure

1. Decide whether a notice is owed before anyone writes one, and treat unknown the same as lead. Acceptance: the trigger recorded on the ticket as either an identification or a disturbance, naming the work that disturbed the line. What wrong looks like: sending a notice only on full replacements, which misses the meter change, the repair coupling and the shutdown that also shook the line. Stop rule: a lead-status-unknown service that was worked on gets the full notice package, because the reason to flush is the disturbance, not the confirmed material. Hazard: none at this step, it is a desk decision, but a miss here is silent and nobody downstream catches it.
2. Pull the water system's current program figures rather than reusing last year's letter. Acceptance: the system's stated flush duration, filter provision period and any sampling offer copied onto the job file with the date they were pulled. What wrong looks like: a template still carrying figures from a program that has since been revised. Stop rule: where the system publishes nothing for this address, use the shop's standing default, label it in the notice as the shop's recommendation, and state that the system's figure governs once issued. Hazard: none at this step, it is desk work.
3. Identify every household that drinks from that service, not the person who opened the door. Acceptance: a named recipient list covering the occupant of each unit on the service and the owner of record, with the owner's confirmation in writing of which units are fed by it. What wrong looks like: one notice handed to a tenant in a duplex, with the second unit and the landlord never told. Stop rule: a rental gets both occupant and owner; a multi-unit on one service gets every unit or the notice does not go out. Hazard: none at this step, but the person who signs is often not the person who makes up formula, which is why the instruction also goes on the tap in step 7.
4. Write the flushing instruction with the taps named by room and the duration stated in minutes. Acceptance: each cold tap used for drinking or cooking named individually, the run time stated as a number, the instruction to remove and clean the aerator first, and the order to run them in. What wrong looks like: "run the water for a bit before you drink it", which every household interprets differently. Stop rule: hot water is never used for drinking, cooking or formula, before or after the flush, because it dissolves more lead from any lead-bearing component still in the building; if the occupant says they always use hot to fill the kettle, that goes in the notice as its own line. Hazard: none in the writing.
5. Fit the filter, confirm what it is certified for, and write the change date on the housing, before the line is disturbed. Acceptance: a filter certified to NSF/ANSI 53 for lead reduction fitted at the named drinking tap, the cartridge change date written on the housing in marker, and the provision period from step 2 stated in the notice. What wrong looks like: a pitcher or faucet unit certified only to NSF/ANSI 42, which covers taste, odor and chlorine and makes no lead claim at all. Stop rule: a filter without a lead reduction certification is not fitted and the work that required one does not proceed until a certified unit is on site. Hazard: a cartridge run past its rated capacity can release accumulated lead rather than hold it, which is why the date goes on the housing in marker rather than into somebody's memory.
6. Run the first flush yourself, in front of the occupant, at one named tap, after the disturbance. Acceptance: one tap flushed for the stated duration with the aerator off, the occupant present, the time recorded. What wrong looks like: describing the flush instead of doing it, after which nobody removes an aerator; or running it before the line is disturbed, which proves nothing about the water the household will draw afterward. Stop rule: if the flushed water is still discolored at the end of the stated duration, do not sign off; keep flushing, record the extra time, and report the result to the water system. Hazard: pulling an aerator releases small spring-loaded parts and, on a single-lever mixer, hot water, so shut and relieve the fixture and catch the parts over a towel; run the flush cold only, and where a tub spout is used for its higher flow, set and check the handle full cold before opening it, because a drifted mixer at full flow scalds quickly.
7. Deliver it in a form the household can act on, and post a copy at the tap. Acceptance: the notice handed over and a short placard left at the filtered tap, photographed in place, in the household's language where the water system publishes a translation. What wrong looks like: a verbal walkthrough in English to a household that speaks another language at home, with the paperwork left on a counter. Stop rule: if nobody present can read the notice, leave it posted, do not treat the visit as delivery, and have the office issue a translated copy inside the system's stated notification window. Hazard: none at this step.
8. Get a signature or record the refusal, then close the loop at the end of the flush period. Acceptance: a signature and date, or a documented refusal with the notice left posted and mailed to the owner of record, plus a scheduled follow-up contact at the end of the filter provision period confirming the cartridge was changed. What wrong looks like: closing the job at the signature, after which nobody knows whether the filter is still working. Stop rule: a refusal to accept the notice does not stop the report to the water system, and it is written into the record in the occupant's own words. Hazard: none at this step, it is paperwork, but the shop does not say whether the water is safe, estimate exposure or give health advice; that question routes to the lead, who sends it to the water system, a state-certified laboratory and the local health department.

The record this produces

One notification record per service, holding: the trigger and the work that caused it; the system program figures with the date pulled; the recipient list and the owner's confirmation of units on the service; the named taps and stated duration; the filter make, its certification, and the change date written on the housing; the demonstration flush time and result; the placard photograph; and the signature, or the refusal in the occupant's words, with the mailing record.

The office reads the follow-up date to make the cartridge call. The lead reads the demonstration flush result when the customer phones about discolored water two weeks later, because a flush that never ran clear is the first thing to check. The water system reads the delivery confirmation if they audit the program.

One worked pass, including a failure

A two-unit rental on one 1 in service, built 1951. Verification found lead on the street side, copper inside. The shop is replacing a leaking meter-side coupling, which is a disturbance, not a replacement.

Step 1: trigger recorded as disturbance, work named as a coupling repair at the meter. Step 2: the system's program, pulled that morning, states 5 minutes at each cold tap used for drinking and cooking and a filter provision period of 6 months; both figures recorded as read from the system's program with the date. Step 3: owner confirms in writing that both units are on the one service, so two occupant notices plus one owner copy. Step 4: instruction names the kitchen cold tap and the bathroom cold tap in each unit, 5 minutes each, aerators off, kitchen first.

Step 5 fails. The van stock filter is a faucet-mount unit certified to NSF/ANSI 42 only. Stop rule taken: it is not fitted and the coupling is not cut. The office sends two units certified to NSF/ANSI 53 for lead reduction; work resumes the same afternoon and change dates 6 months out are written on both housings.

Step 6, run after the repair: unit A's kitchen tap runs clear inside the 5 minutes. Unit B's kitchen tap is still faintly cloudy at 5 minutes, so it is flushed a further 4 minutes, total 9 minutes, and clears; the extra time is recorded and reported to the system with the note that unit B is on a longer interior run. Step 7: both notices handed over, placards photographed at both filtered taps. Step 8: unit A signs. Unit B's occupant refuses to sign and says so plainly, which is recorded in their words, the notice is left posted and mailed to the owner, and the report to the water system goes out unchanged.

References

• The EPA Lead and Copper Rule Revisions and Lead and Copper Rule Improvements, as administered by your state's primacy agency, for the notification and filter provision duties that sit with the water system and reach the shop through their program.
• NSF/ANSI 53 for lead reduction and NSF/ANSI 42 for aesthetic effects, which are different claims on different contaminants and are not interchangeable.
• Your water system's published lead program for this address, which sets the flush duration and filter period the notice states.
• See related: the Plumbing service line material verification methods SOP, the lead service line replacement standard, the post-replacement flushing and sampling SOP, and the point-of-use filter selection and installation SOP.