Escape of water is the most expensive class of home insurance claim in the UK, with insurers paying out around £1.8 million every day for burst pipes and leaks, and the average claim now running into several thousand pounds. A leak that starts the morning you fly to Spain has a fortnight to soak through ceilings before anyone notices. Ten minutes of holiday plumbing checks before you travel removes most of that risk.

With the summer getaway approaching, here is the checklist our engineers recommend to every Liverpool household, plus the small repairs worth booking before the suitcases come out.

Find and Use Your Stop Tap Before You Need It

The internal stop tap, usually under the kitchen sink or where the mains enters the house, is the single most important fitting in your plumbing system. Turning it off before a long trip means that even if a joint fails, only the water already in the pipes can escape. Test it this week, because stop taps seize after years untouched, and a seized tap during an emergency is no tap at all.

If yours will not turn, or it turns without stopping the flow, have it replaced before you go. Our plumbing team in Liverpool replaces seized stop taps in under an hour, and many customers add a modern quarter-turn lever valve that anyone in the household can operate.

The Pre-Travel Checks Worth Ten Minutes of Your Time

Walk the house and look at every flexible hose: washing machine, dishwasher, and the braided connectors under basins and toilets. These hoses are the most common failure point in modern homes, and a perished one lets mains-pressure water flow until someone shuts it off. Bulging, rust spots, or kinks mean replacement, which costs a few pounds per hose.

Check the loft if you have tanks up there, look for damp staining under the bath panel, and run your hand along visible pipe joints. Slow drips leave green or white crust on copper fittings long before they become leaks. Anything suspicious is worth a photo and a call before you leave rather than a claim after you return.

Outside, clear gutters and check that the overflow pipes from tanks and the boiler discharge somewhere visible. A summer storm hitting blocked guttering can push water into the eaves of an empty house just as effectively as a burst pipe, and overflow pipes that drip constantly are an early warning worth heeding.

Holiday Plumbing Checks for Boilers and Hot Water

Modern combi boilers are happy switched to standby or holiday mode, which keeps frost protection active while cutting gas use to almost nothing. Households with a hot water cylinder can switch the immersion and programmer off entirely for a summer trip. There is no need to heat water for an empty house.

Pressure is the thing to glance at before you go. A combi that has been losing pressure weekly has a leak somewhere, often a tired expansion vessel or a weeping radiator valve, and two unattended weeks will not improve it. Our servicing and repairs team can diagnose persistent pressure loss in a single visit, and June is an easy month to get a convenient slot.

Washing machines and dishwashers deserve their own habit: turn their isolation valves off before any long trip. The machine valves sit behind or beside the appliance and take seconds to close, removing mains pressure from the two hoses most likely to fail in the whole house.

Toilets deserve a glance too. A flush valve that runs on wastes hundreds of litres a day in an empty house and can mask the sound signature a smart meter would otherwise flag. Listen for hissing after the cistern refills, and have any running flush repaired before you go.

Smart Leak Detection and Insurance Considerations

Smart leak detectors have come down to the price of a smoke alarm and sit under sinks, behind toilets, or next to the boiler, pinging your phone the moment they sense water. Whole-home shut-off valves go further, closing the mains automatically when flow patterns look like a burst. Several insurers now discount premiums for fitted leak detection.

It is also worth reading your policy before travelling. Many insurers apply unoccupancy conditions after 30 or 60 consecutive days, and some expect the water turned off during extended absences. The Association of British Insurers guidance on escape of water explains how these claims work and what insurers expect homeowners to do.

Small Repairs to Book Before the Getaway

A dripping tap, a toilet that runs on, a radiator valve that weeps onto the carpet: none of these are emergencies, which is exactly why they get ignored until they are. Booking them together before a holiday costs less than separate call-outs, and there is a discount when multiple services are booked in one visit.

If something does go wrong while you are away, a neighbour with a key and the stop tap location can save your ceilings. Leave our number alongside, because we handle emergency plumbing across Liverpool and the North West all summer. For anything urgent before you travel, get in touch and we will fit you in before your departure date.

If the house will stand empty for more than a week, the Energy Saving Trust advice on switching the water heating off rather than leaving it ticking over is worth a read before you go.

A Five Minute Routine for Departure Day

On the morning you leave, work through a short routine. Close the internal stop tap, open a cold tap for a few seconds to drop the pressure in the pipes, and check the dishwasher and washing machine valves are off. Set the boiler to holiday mode and glance at the pressure gauge on your way past.

Then do the thirty second walk: under the sink, behind the toilets, and around the cylinder if you have one. You are looking for fresh drips, damp patches, or anything that smells musty. Catching a weep on departure morning is annoying, but catching it after two weeks away is a ceiling down.

Leave the heating system’s frost protection enabled even in summer, and leave internal doors open so air circulates. Finally, text the key holder the stop tap location and our number. A note taped inside a kitchen cupboard works just as well, and the whole routine takes five minutes from start to finish.

Frequently Asked Questions

Travel Knowing the House Is Sound

A holiday should start at the airport, not with a phone call from a neighbour about water coming through the kitchen ceiling. Run the checks this weekend, book any small repairs in good time, and travel knowing the house is sound. If you would like an engineer to look everything over before you go, we are a phone call away.