How do I turn off the mains at my entrance

Anticlock wise. Make sure there are no appliances using the cold water feed when you do it. When the cold water tap in the kitchen stops then you know you have it off properly.

Have they a big hedge? I have an external one inside my wall but no one would ever find it as the hedge planted by the wall has grown thick and practically covered where it is. Only that I know exactly where it is there is not a hope it would be found.

My own, when I built the house it was fairly obvious inside the wall but the hedging has now covered it pretty well.

Don't know where the mains is outside the wall, thankfully have never needed to look for it.

OP the sponge you lifted to get access to the stop cock and blue plastic lever are typical of the new water meter stop cocks on the mains.

You most definitely can turn them off yourself even though it's located in the footpath or at side of the road just outside your boundary wall of your house. The original brass stop cock that was on the pipe before they replaced it with the water meter plastic valve etc was usually in the same place and nothing prevented people from accessing it to turn off water to your house usually for repairs.

Also the other person who enquire about turning it off without calling the council is not informed properly. You don't need council permission to access it. Although there's usually another one further along the road that is in the middle of the road and would control water for several houses in an area or a separate street in a town and your not allowed to touch this one. Probably get fined for it etc but the one outside your house you can access it yourself with no problems.

No you don't need to contact Irish water to get permission to turn off the water to your house.

Well it's a good idea to find it as it's the best way to turn off the water if any leaks in house. Also when you do find it, turn it off and see that it is working. It goes directly to the cold tap in kitchen sink and also up to the tank in attic.

If it hasn't been turned off in several years it can get stuck/broken and won't turn off even if it turns, as the valve internally is stuck in the on position. Then check if any water comes out of the cold kitchen sink tap.

If its broken and water still comes out of the cold kitchen sink tap but you've turned it off outside, this is the best way to contact Irish Water and request a repair. They will inform your local council who will come to fix it.

It's very important that it's working as the day you need to turn off the water in an emergency and it's not working properly and not turning off the water...so best to check now.

Have a look on footpath outside your house or if you in the countryside and there's no footpath, check carefully the ground outside your house on the road. Lots of times when councils retarmac the roads they accidentally tar over the lid of the water mains. But now with the new water meters installed all over the country you probably have the new meter installed and the lid is a large round one about 6 inches diameter. Then again there's still some houses around the country that the mains water lid is tarmacked over and the contractors for Irish water were unaware of the location of the original stop cock on the water mains to people's houses so these people never got the new water meter installed.

It could be the same situation with your house. It's worth it to find where your main stop cock is.

Re your comment 'I don't know who's telling you etc' nobody's telling me, I was merely respondong to original poster wondering where their stopcock was and suggesting it could be under hedge like mine is at the moment!

The one in my garden definitely wasn't fitted by council, if they did it was a very bad job, it is just like a tap basically at the bottom of a bit of pipe, done by the builder at the time and covered over with a paint can lid of all things and a bit of paving slab.

I didn't advise them to contact council or Irish water! Re read the posts, I merely said I, I as in me, would be slow to do it without checking but then again I have an alternative. I'm out now, can't be doing with this! Was merely trying to be helpful in first post suggesting where it could be!

There's usually no external stop cock in the grounds of your house, the water meter one you mentioned is the only one. Unless you know for certain that there is one then again maybe you have been misinformed by some one that there's one?

But if you are definite there's another separate external stop cock that's fine.