Just been the neighbours whose house I’m keeping an eye on whilst they’re away and they’ve had a leak from the loft which has caused a load of plaster board, lagging and water to come down. Now it’s clearly going to be an insurance fix but in order to ensure no further water damage should I do anything other than turn the water off at the stopcock and turn off the water/heating timer, bearing in mind:

– it’s a hot water tank based system, not a combi
– in the loft, the only water I’m aware of is in a header tank (setup is similar to our house)
– it’s not a roof/tiles issue as there’s a guilty looking pipe positioned right above the damp patch in the carpet and it’s hardly rained since they went away
– the water stopped coming down a while back as there’s no puddles so the pipe appears to be tank and not mains fed

Thanks experts!

Yes, turn off water and heating. Also run the taps to run any water out of the header tank.

EDIT: Make sure there isn’t an immersion heater that is running (or set to a timed run).

Thanks Johndoh

I ran the cold taps to make sure the stop cock was working.

Should I drain the hot water system too, now the mains is off or will I screw it up by allowing loads of air into the system?

might be worth draining hot as well sounds like a lot of damage anyway and an insurance job can sort that as same time?
*NOT a plumber

Should I drain the hot water system too, now the mains is off or will I screw it up by allowing loads of air into the system?

IANAPlumber but I would. There is probably a stop cock on the header tank or a ball valve you can tie up to prevent refilling, then drain hot till the header is empty. make sure the immersion doesn’t come on.

That’s what I did anyway, then got a new tank from Wickes.. luckily the ceiling survived as I noticed it early.

As above, drain what you can and if the ceiling looks like it is under pressure from water you can poke a small hole in the plasterboard and put a bucket underneath. It will reduce the chance of the ceiling coming down.

If this was me I’d feel it was somehow my fault just for being in possession of a set of keys for the property whilst the owner was away.

I hope it all gets sorted out!

If this was me I’d feel it was somehow my fault just for being in possession of a set of keys for the property whilst the owner was away.

Ha, just what I thought!

Sorry, nothing helpful to add!

The ceiling came down long before I found it 🙁

My conscience is clear but I may not qualify for a tin of fudge, hula skirt, plastic camel or whatever they’ll bring back… (not sure where they’ve gone).

I’ll go around with a big bucket and dump the hot water – the header shouldn’t refill as the mains is off and the cold water system drained but the header itself is in the loft which will be ball ache to get into and poke around.

Thanks all!