Water Filtration near you

A filter housing spliced into the cold water supply is a plumbing product installed in a drinking water system, and Australian practice treats it as such. WaterMark certification is the scheme that authorises plumbing and drainage products for use, and a licensed plumber should be able to show you that the housing, the tap and the fittings are certified. Buying an uncertified unit online and having it fitted is the most common way a household ends up with an installation a plumber will later refuse to work on.

The lead requirement is the change to watch. NCC Volume Three now limits lead in copper alloy plumbing products used to convey drinking water to 0.25 per cent, under Clause A5G4, and compliant products are certified and marked with the Lead Free WaterMark and listed in the WaterMark Product Database. The ABCB agreed a transition period for industry, and in December 2025 extended the arrangement for installation to 2028. Because individual states and territories may set different transition dates, the practical advice is to ask your plumber what the current position is in your jurisdiction rather than assuming a single national date.

One more regulated point often skipped: a device connected to the drinking water line must not create a path for water to flow backwards into the supply. Backflow prevention is controlled by your water authority, and whether your installation needs a specific device is a question for them and for your plumber, not for the filter's packaging.

A point-of-use filter treats one tap. Because the only water it processes is the water you drink and cook with, the cartridge lasts far longer, the unit is smaller, and the running cost is lower. For the classic town-water complaint — chlorine taste in a glass of water — it is almost always the better buy, and a dedicated filtered tap at the sink is the standard form.

A whole-of-house filter treats everything: showers, laundry, garden taps and the hot water system. That is worth paying for when the problem affects more than drinking. Heavy sediment from a tank or a bore will damage tapware and appliances throughout the house, and no undersink cartridge protects them. Chlorine sensitivity in the shower is another genuine reason. But a whole-of-house unit is processing thousands of litres to improve the small fraction you drink, which is why cartridge costs climb.

The honest middle path in many Australian houses on tank or bore water is both: a coarse sediment stage on the incoming service to protect the plumbing, and a finer carbon or ceramic stage at the kitchen tap for what you actually consume.

A filter that is never changed is worse than no filter. A loaded carbon cartridge stops adsorbing, the trapped organic material becomes a place for bacteria to colonise, and flow falls away as the medium blocks. The manufacturer will state an interval in litres or in months; the shorter of the two is the one to follow, and a household that entertains, has teenagers or fills a lot of water bottles will reach the volume limit well before the calendar one.

Set a reminder rather than waiting for the taste to come back, because by the time a carbon filter tastes exhausted it has been exhausted for a while. Write the date on the housing at every change. If you are away for an extended period, run the filtered tap for a while when you return before drinking, rather than drinking water that has been sitting in a cartridge for weeks.

Connecting a filter to the drinking water supply is licensed plumbing work in every Australian state and territory. This surprises people who have installed a cartridge housing themselves overseas, but the Australian position is consistent and strict: the work is licensed, and the licensed job produces a certificate under whichever scheme your state or territory operates. Keep it. It is the document that matters if the installation later leaks into a kitchen cabinet and you need to make a claim.

Because licensing and certification are state and territory functions rather than national ones, the name of the certificate and the process for issuing it differ across the country. Ask which one applies to you, confirm the plumber's licence covers the work, and ask for the WaterMark certification details of the products being installed at the same time. All three questions take one conversation and save the argument later.