As virtually all modern washing machines are cold fill, what do you do with the old hot water tap which is no longer needed?

The old hot water tap should ideally be capped off by screwing a special blanking cap onto it. This is wise because I’ve heard of several cases where the unused hot tap has eventually started to drip, or even where the lever has been accidentally knocked partially on later. This can happen if the hot tap is in the kitchen sink cupboard. I’ve also seen cases where the washing machine itself moved about and knocked the lever when the hot tap was behind the washing machine. This isn’t so likely if your old hot water tap is a proper screw type but the ubiquitous red and blue lever taps are more prone to these issues and it’s safer to blank off any old unused washing machine tap, especially if they are installed out of sight.