A former carer woke up to find she had been left without running water at her her home.

Tracy Windsor, who has lived in Berry Croft for about 14 years, said she "felt neglected" over the lack of water last month.

She contacted Thames Water straight away but the household - which includes Miss Windsor's vulnerable 15-year-old daughter - were still lacking three days later.

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Miss Windsor now hopes to seek legal advice after Thames Water failed to offer her emergency water bottles, leaving her feeling ‘neglected’.

“The fact I don’t think I was treated fairly and the fact I wasn’t even offered water let along brought some is the reason I now want legal advice,” she said.

“I felt ignored. Maybe if I was a man it would have been different but I felt very neglected."

Miss Windsor first discovered the water had stopped running on the morning of December 16.

She contacted the water supplier via WhatsApp but struggled to get any advice.

She said: “I was trying to explain that I have a vulnerable daughter and I have no water but they kept telling me to follow a link to report it but it wasn’t working.

“I said I needed to speak to someone and it went back and forth until eventually I was given a number to call.

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“However, I was on hold all day and couldn’t get through so I rang them back the next day and they said someone will contact me.

“During this time I wasn’t offered any emergency water. Luckily, we borrowed from the neighbour.

“We had to keep going across the road and they’re on a water metre so it wasn’t fair on them either.

“On the hygienic side of things we couldn’t flush the toilet or shower. But Thames Water just weren’t interested.”

By the third day, a plumber was sent out and the water was fixed but the issue was never explained to Ms Winsor.

“On Monday I called and explained the situation as I was upset but they kept pushing it under the carpet and said they were busy which I understand but nobody wanted to help me.”

A spokesperson for Thames Water said: “We’re sorry whenever we don’t respond to customers as quickly as we’d like to and we’re sorry to Ms Windsor for her experience last month.

“We attended the property on December 18 and our engineer found the outside supply valve to the property had frozen over. The engineer de-frosted the outside stop valve which returned the supply in full that day.  

“During this time we were responding to an unprecedented amount of phone calls due to emergencies caused by the extreme and sudden temperature drops, which took place across the country and we fixed around 70 per cent more leaks than normal over this period.

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“We apologise for the inconvenience this caused and for the length of time it took to get in contact with us during those few days. We have been in direct contact with Ms Windsor since her water returned and this is being handled by a dedicated complaints case manager.”

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This story was written by Gee Harland. She joined the team in 2022 as a senior multimedia reporter.

Gee covers Abingdon, Didcot, Wallingford and Wantage.

Get in touch with her by emailing: gee.harland@newsquest.co.uk

Follow her on Twitter @geeharland