Nobody wants this plumbing nightmare to happen….
A recent survey conducted found that over half of all households in the UK were either incapable of turning off their mains water supply or had no idea of where to find the stopcock in their home in the event of an emergency plumbing issue.
Many people who knew where their stopcock was, could not even turn it off, due to the tap seizing over the years or were incapable of reaching the tap due to its poor location.
In addition, many homes did not have an outside stop tap at the front of their homes, so could not even turn off the water if the internal stopcock failed.
When did you last test to see if you could turn off your water supply?
The suggestion is to make sure you know how to turn off your water supply.
If you have no outside stop tap in your street, give your local water authority a call and they should fit one for you free of charge, or provide a better solution for you.
Do you have an old seized up stopcock that won’t turn? Be sure to make sure you can turn the water off in the street before attempting to loosen it with a pair of grips or a hammer!! (bad idea!).
In addition, should you struggle to turn a stopcock, you could ask your local plumber to fit an extra isolator valve or gate valve after the stopcock, these provide an extra bit of security should you find yourself panicking in the event of a flood in your home and they are much easier to turn. Contact stokeplumber.com