WARNING: This is a story about sewage water and other dirty things.

If the thought of this upsets you, imagine the horrifying experience of a businessman who found his year-old office flooded with sewage water from a clogged pipe.

On Wednesday, Mr Wayne Wong, 43, returned to his second-storey unit at Cendex Centre on Lower Delta Road to find sewage water flowing out from under his office doors.

'I could smell the stink even before I opened the doors,' he recalled.

But a worse sight awaited the sales director, who runs a business supplying glass.

'I unlocked the door and found my whole office flooded in two to three inches of sewage water.'

The water had gushed out of a clogged pipe in the office toilet. In his private office room, the table and chairs were sitting in 5cm of sewage water.

'My whole office has turned into a toilet,' MrWong said, shaking his head.

No one was in the office at that time.

Mr Wong, who started using the office in August 2007, said he has no employees yet.

He said he spent close to $100,000 on renovation, custom-built cabinets and hidden trunking for wires.

'I could have rented an office space at a cheaper rate at one of the industrial parks around here,' he said, 'but I chose this unit because the building was quite new.'

The building is just over a year old.

Mr Wong, who pays rent of $5,800 a month, said he chose the unit because of its location and fengshui.

His office, including two parking lots outside his unit, has a combined area of 1,600 sq ft.

'I even paid $4,000 for a fengshui master to approve the location and set-up,' he lamented.

'Can you imagine, you have a nice, new-looking office, and now you see waste floating about? It's very frustrating and is disruptive to my business.'

When The New Paper visited the office a day after the incident, the floor still had puddles of sewage water and an unbearable stench permeated the place.

The toilet was no longer flooded, but the entire floor was covered with brown debris and waste and boxes of goods in a storage area beside the toilet were soaked at the bottom.

New cabinets

Mr Wong said: 'I have to change all the built-in cabinets because their bottoms are wet and I don't want termite problems later due to the damp wood.'

He claimed the problem was due to 'the internal plumbing system of the building', adding: ' The building management should take responsibility.'

The neighbouring unit was not affected, but MrWilliam Teo, who owns a kitchen showroom just below, said they could not use their toilet 'because of the smell'.

Mr Wong claims the same thing happened to him in December last year, ruining his carpets and affecting his goods.

He is in the midst of seeking more than $8,000 in compensation from the building's management for that incident.

He said: 'To have it happen a second time is too much.'

The building's manager, Mr Don Sim, declined comment, saying the matter was under investigation by its insurance company.

This article was first published in The New Paper on September 13, 2008.