Secret life of…a plumber: ‘Rude customers are rife – I’ve walked off site a couple of times’

On an average day, I’ll go to about six jobs. My shift starts at eight and usually ends at 6pm. The work ranges from leaking pipes, dripping taps, clearing internal blockages and fixing faulty heating systems. I’ll work one week of night shifts every nine weeks and about five weekends in a nine-week period. 

The best bits of the job are finding a solution to a problem. I love finding out the issue and fixing it; when you figure out a complex problem, you feel like you’ve earned a gold star. I also like talking to the customers. You go into their houses and their lives. You get to hear their stories. 

You do get a lot of stressed people. I try to be mindful that what’s an emergency to the customer is often not really an emergency to me. “Oh, water’s pouring through your ceiling? No problem,” I’ll say, because I see it day in and day out and I know what to do and what’s the worst that can happen. But it can be incredibly stressful for the customer, so when they’re snappy, I try not to take offence. 

The worst bits of the job can also be the customers. While people used to seek me out as a female plumber when I was a sole trader, now that I work for an insurance provider the customer doesn’t know a woman plumber is coming and some of them have a problem with it. Twice I’ve had to walk off site. 

When I turned up at one man’s house, he said: “I told them I wanted a man.”

I said, “OK, do you want me to look at the problem?”

“I’m not happy with this,” he replied.

When I was trying to do the work, he kept coming in and saying that I didn’t know what I was doing because I was a woman and there was no place for us in the industry. That’s when I said, “OK, I’m going to leave now.”

I have had times when I’ve felt unsafe in a customer’s house. Luckily it’s never gone far enough that I’ve had to press the little SOS alarm that my work gives all the plumbers.

But I’ve been to some houses, especially during the night, when people have had too much to drink. They’ve been rowdy and I’ve felt that if I said the wrong thing it could tip into a fight. 

The work can also take a toll on your body. I’ve had five operations on my back now. I’m not sure what triggered the first problem but my work has definitely contributed. You have to get yourself into very awkward positions, such as crawling underneath a kitchen tap or climbing under floorboards.

I’d love to say I’ll be a plumber until retirement but realistically, with my back how it is, I will probably start working as a team leader where I supervise other plumbers. 

When I had my last back operation, the doctor started talking about putting a rod in my back. I said, “But what about my work? If I have a rod in my back, I won’t be able to bend.”

I honestly don’t know what else I’d do for work. I don’t have any regrets and I’d encourage other girls to become plumbers. 

*Names have been changed.