Should I turn my water off before I go on holiday?
The short answer
Yes — if you're away for more than a few days, turning the water off at the stopcock is cheap insurance. A leak that would be a wiped-up puddle while you're home becomes a fortnight of running water while you're not. In winter, leave the heating on a low setting or its frost protection so the pipes don't freeze while the water is off.
The two pieces of advice sound contradictory — water off, heating on — but they're solving different problems. The stopcock limits how much water can escape if something fails. The heating stops the water already sitting in the pipes from freezing and splitting them.
Worth checking before a longer trip: many home insurance policies have conditions about unoccupied properties, and some require the water to be turned off (and sometimes the system drained) beyond a certain number of days, often around 30. If you're away for a while and you haven't read that section of your policy, it's the section to read.
If you have a combi boiler, turning the mains off means no hot water and, in most cases, no heating demand being met — so leave the mains on and the heating running on frost protection if the house needs to stay warm. If you're unsure which set-up you have, ask your plumber to show you what to switch off before you go.
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