Water shut off

[GMM]

Six months ago, Severn Trent (or their contractors) came along and re- piped all the water mains in my road. Unfortunately, I was away at the time, so didn't get to see how everything worked or have a chat with the blokes doing it. I would very much like to change one of the internal stopcocks in the house as I'm doing up the room and it leaks just a tad. I know they will come along on request and turn it off for you, but I'd rather not have to take a day off just to do this job, so I was hoping to deal with it myself (after all, it's not exactly complex/dangerous etc etc to turn a tap off for a bit!). I had a look over the weekend and couldn't see how to get at the shut off in the street. The access is now in a circular plastic plate about 8 inches across with a key hole. Of course, the key hole is full of asphalt from where they re-surfaced as part of the job. Even digging all that out doesn't help a lot as I can't really see what's going on. Does anyone know how these things are opened and, particularly, whether the keys are available anywhere? Everything I've found so far seems to be too small for the job.

Any help much appreciated, as ever.

[Lobster]

Presumably the stopcock you're trying to access is the water company's own, and presumably will turn off the water for the whole area not just your house. So not surprising that it's locked to prevent you getting at it!

You ought to have a separate outside stopcock which just isolates your own property - sometimes they are missing but frequently the hatches get lost or buried - have you checked for one?

David

[The Medway Handyman]

Same experience here in Mid Kent Waters area.

[Dave Osborne]

Call Severn Trent "Operational Contact Centre" 0800 783 4444 and enquire about the location of your Controlling Stop Tap (CST) at the boundary of your property, which will be owned by Severn Trent and be their responsibility. Tell them that you need to move/repair the Internal Stop Tap (IST), so you need to isolate the water at the boundary of the property.

They will send an inspector to try and find your Controlling Stop Tap, and if it's not there or not accessible, the inspector will raise a work order for a crew to come and sort it out/fit a new controlling stop tap (at no cost to you).

HTH

[GMM]

Thanks chaps, but that's what I've always been sort of used to, and these ones do have a couple of opposing notches, but also have a key slot. Being a flimsy plastic thing, I'm a bit reluctant to heave on it too hard, but it seemed pretty solid when I tried a couple of big screwdrivers, so I reckoned that the key slot thingy (like a flat oval hole with a circular middle. about 1.5 inches end to end) must be doing something. It was full of tarry muck and when i dug that out I could see shiny metal but can't see enough to work out what's happening down there.

Ah well, it looks like I might be forced to resort to taking a day out while a highly skilled man wot turns it off comes along for ten minutes. Either that, or a good clout with a big 'ammer and then tell them something big must have driven over it....

[Roger Mills]

Care to upload a photo somewhere, and post a link to it here - in case anyone is able to identify the type of cover you have?

[the_constructor]

Would you like to hear about a similar story...?

My friend asked me to fix a leaking tap on his bath yesterday, so off I goes with the toolbox.

I tried to turn the stopcock off inside the house under the kitchen sink. This was jammed solid. I later discovered that the stopcock was only for the kitchen sink. Searched all over for a stopcock for the upstairs and found absolutely nothing.

I decided to turn the water off in the street jut outside the back gate. This stopcock belongs to Northumbrian Water Ltd and is one of those funny things that is turned with a plastic tool with an hexagonal tip. Couldn't move it at all. Used a metal tool given to me by one of their engineers a few years ago and still couldn't move it. It only has to turn 1/4 of a turn and water will be off.

I rang Northumbrian Water and explained the situation to them and was promptly told not to touch their equipment as it would cost me if I damaged it. They then informed me, that they would send an engineer out to turn the water off, here's the sting, at a cost of £57.20

• VAT. I explained, that, their equipment was faulty and they were breaking their duty of care by not allowing me to operate their equipment in the case of an emergency. Do not touch it was the warning. I rang off.

I rang again 5 minutes after and stated the problem again. I was told exactly the same thing. I was gobsmacked.

So, if no householder can not touch their equipment, in the case of a burst pipe inside the house, do they phone the water company and wait several hours for an engineer to call and be totally flooded out in the meantime ?

Your suggestions would be most appreciated.

James

[GMM]

Sounds like a bit of a fix to be in: I thought they were obliged to come and turn off for freebie on request and they would normally fix any faults when they found them, like a seized fitting (when I posted, I was simply trying to find a way to turn it off without taking the day off).

At a previous house, I had a different problem: The stopcock within my boundary was buried about twice as deep as usual and, being a bodge job, started to leak. I dug a trench (which duly filled with water), but I couldn't find the water board stopcock, which is normally in the street right outside, so I arranged with them to come and turn off while I fixed my stopcock. After a day of twiddling my thumbs without them showing, I called and complained vigorously and arranged another date. Same again, no show, so I managed to get through to the local manager, who promised to come and deal with it personally before the start of the working day.

The guv'nor duly arrived in his suit and Jag and scratched his head looking for the stopcock. In the end, after I pressed my point further, he got into the trench and, thigh-deep in muddy water in his suit, repaired my stopcock then dripped off back to his pristine Jag. Great service, but I wish I'd had a video camera in those days(!).

Oddly enough, the following week, a team went along the road and fitted stopcocks outside each house....

By the way, good suggestion Roger, I'll post a photo somewhere as soon as I get home (working away right at the moment).

Cheers chaps.