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Find your stopcock: a two-minute check every homeowner should do

The most common thing we hear on an emergency call-out is that the homeowner did not know where their stopcock was, or found it but it would not turn. Both are fixable in two minutes right now, before anything is wrong.

The usual locations

Under the kitchen sink is the most common spot in modern housing. In older Sandwich town-centre properties, look also in a downstairs cupboard, under the stairs, in a utility room, or close to where the water main visibly enters the building through the floor or an external wall. Flats and properties with a separate water meter sometimes have the stopcock next to the meter itself, indoors or in an external meter box.

What it looks like

Usually a small lever or a wheel-style tap set into the pipe, often with a red or black handle, sometimes a plain brass fitting with no handle at all where it needs a specific key or a set of pliers. If you genuinely cannot find one, that is worth flagging to us on a routine visit rather than waiting for an emergency to discover it.

Test it, gently

Once a year, turn it fully off and back on. Stopcocks that are never operated can seize over time, particularly on older properties, which means the one moment you actually need it to work is exactly when you find out it does not. If it feels stiff, seized, or will not turn at all, that is worth replacing before it becomes urgent rather than after.

Know the outside stopcock too

Most properties also have an external stopcock near the boundary, usually under a small cover in the pavement or front garden, which belongs to the water company rather than you. You are not expected to operate this one yourself in normal circumstances, but knowing it exists is useful context if a leak turns out to be on the supply side rather than inside your own property.