Report an Emergency Happening Now

Report an emergency during or outside of office hours

If there is a risk to life, call 999 immediately.

On this page:

Report an emergency

During office hours

Our office hours are:

Monday to Thursday: 8.30am to 5pm
Friday: 8.30am to 4.30pm

During these hours, please call 01635 551111.

Please note: you will be referred to the most appropriate service to respond to the emergency, including the Emergency Planning Service.

Outside office hours

There is a limited service out of hours for emergencies only.

To report an emergency out of hours, please call 01635 551111.

You will be given a number of options; if you know the option, you can press that number immediately to save time. The options are:

option 1: for emergencies about Children or Adult Social Care, or if you are homeless
option 2: for lost or found dogs
option 3: for Council car park issues
option 4: to be passed to a call handler for genuine emergencies only

Please only contact us in the event of an emergency, such as those listed below:

Emergencies include:

major incidents - for example major accidents, significant flooding
safeguarding concerns (social care)
highways issues, including:
- fallen trees and other debris blocking or restricting roads or causing potential danger to road or footpath users
- traffic lights not working (please note: West Berkshire Council only manages permanent traffic lights, and some but not all temporary traffic lights) to find out more visit our roadworks page, here
flooding of properties (inside the property, not in gardens), and roads
emergency repairs to council-owned temporary accommodation (please note: tenants of properties should contact their Housing Association, landlord or agent)

Emergencies do not include:

bins not being collected
payments to the council
fallen trees or debris that is not blocking or restricting roads or causing potential danger to road users or on private land
noise complaints which are not related to council facilities or property

You can also contact some of these services directly out of hours, as set out below:

Adults and children safeguarding concerns or homelessness

If you have any safeguarding concerns, please visit our Child Concern page or Safeguarding Adults page. Or for homeless concerns, please see the Homelessness Support page.

Reporting a lost or found dog

If your concern relates to a lost or found dog, please contact our Animal Warden service.

Report non-emergencies

You can report non-emergency issues online at any time on our report a problem page, this includes reporting issues such as potholes, broken streetlights and flooding on a road.

You can find out about when and where we're performing scheduled maintenance on our roads here.

If you want to report a non-emergency during office hours, you can also contact Customer Services.

Other emergency contacts:

Gas

If you think you have a gas leak, or can smell gas, leave the house and phone the National Gas Emergencies number immediately on 0800 111 999.

Please visit the National Grid website for more information about gas emergencies.

Electricity

If you have a power cut, call the national power cut helpline on 105 to get up-to-date information. They should also be able to let you know when the power will be back on.

Alternatively you can check using Power Track (ssen.co.uk).

Highways issues

To report an incident (including flooding) on the M4 or A34, contact National Highways on 0300 123 5000. You can also report an issue on the National Highways website.

To report an incident (including flooding) on all other public roads in West Berkshire, please visit our report a problem page.

To find out more about traffic issues on the road network, check the National Highways 'Traffic England' website.

Flooding

If a flood is happening now and there is a risk to life, call 999.
Please be aware that during severe weather, the emergency services will be very busy.

Where you report flooding depends on the location and cause of the flooding; to find out more see our report flooding page.

To find out more about who to report to you can check the GOV.UK website.