Since 2010
Blocked drains in Pontefract
Before you ring anybody about a blocked drain, spend two minutes working out what you are actually dealing with. It changes who should be paying for it, and on a fair number of the jobs we get called to, the answer is not you.
We have been clearing blocked drains from Queens Avenue in Pontefract since 2010, and we cover Knottingley, Castleford, Featherstone, Ackworth, Darrington and Wakefield too.
Here is how to tell what you have got.
Answered out of hours, every hour
You know the price before we start
A written price before any work begins, agreed with you. No day rates quoted over the phone, no extras appearing on the invoice.
Plumbing, electrics and roofing, one contractor
A leak that has taken out the lights needs a plumber and an electrician. You call once and we send both, rather than you chasing two trades.
Who we work with
Homes, rentals and commercial property in Pontefract and surrounding areas.
The same trades, the same standards and the same written pricing whether it is a family home, a rental portfolio or a commercial building.
Homeowners
Repairs, replacements and improvements. Priced clearly before we start.
- ✓ Every trade under one contractor
- ✓ Free written quotes, no obligation
- ✓ All work fully guaranteed
Landlords and letting agents
Tenanted property looked after without you having to be there.
- ✓ Direct contact with your tenant
- ✓ Photographs and sign-off on every job
- ✓ Gas and electrical certification
Commercial and healthcare
Maintenance and repairs planned around the people using the building.
- ✓ Out of hours attendance
- ✓ Work planned around occupants
- ✓ 24/7 emergency cover, 365 days
Below is how to work out what you are dealing with, whose drain it actually is, and what clearing it properly involves.
One sink, or the whole house?
If one sink, bath or toilet drains slowly and everything else is fine, the blockage is close by. It is in the trap, the waste pipe or the first few feet beyond it.
This is the cheapest kind and usually the quickest to sort.
Everything on the ground floor at once
If the kitchen sink gurgles when you flush the toilet, or the shower fills up when the washing machine empties, the blockage is past the point where all those pipes join together. That means the main drain, not a single waste pipe.
Stop using water in the house until it is cleared, because anything you run adds to what is already sitting there.
Water rising in an outside gully or manhole
Lift the manhole cover if you can get to it safely. If the chamber nearest the house is full but the one nearest the boundary is empty, the blockage is between the two and it is yours.
If both are full, the blockage is past your boundary, which usually makes it Yorkshire Water’s rather than yours.
Worth knowing if you are in one of the older terraced rows around Pontefract and Featherstone: a lot of those houses share a drain run with the properties on either side.
If your neighbours are having the same trouble on the same day, you are almost certainly looking at the shared drain rather than anything inside your own boundary.
Whose drain is it, yours or Yorkshire Water's?
Since October 2011 most private sewers and the drains running from houses out to the public sewer have belonged to the water companies rather than the homeowner. In Pontefract that is Yorkshire Water.
The rule of thumb: pipes inside your boundary that serve only your house are yours. Anything past the boundary, or shared with the houses either side, is usually Yorkshire Water’s. There is a full breakdown of who is responsible for what on our plumbing services in Pontefract page.
Use the manhole test above to work out which you have got. If one house is affected and the problem is inside your boundary, it is yours. If several houses are affected, or the blockage is past the boundary, it is theirs, and they will usually come out at no cost to you.
Ring them before you ring a plumber and you may find you do not need one. We would rather tell you that than send you a bill for it.
What to do if Yorkshire Water says it is yours
It happens, and sometimes they are right.
If you are not convinced, a CCTV survey settles it. The camera shows exactly where the blockage or the damage is and which side of the boundary it sits on. A recorded survey is a lot harder to argue with than two people stood over a manhole disagreeing.
What actually blocks drains around here
Wipes
Wipes are the biggest single cause by a long way.
The ones sold as flushable break down far more slowly than toilet paper, and in a pipe with any build-up already in it they snag and start collecting everything that comes along behind them.
Bin them, including the flushable ones.
Fat, oil and food waste
Hot fat goes down as a liquid and sets solid as soon as it hits the cold pipe.
Build that up over a year or two and you have a hard layer narrowing the pipe, which is why kitchen waste pipes tend to block gradually rather than all at once.
Let it cool and scrape it into the bin.
Tree roots and older clay pipework
Plenty of the housing around Pontefract, Featherstone and Castleford still sits on the original clay pipework with mortar joints.
Roots find their way into the joints and then catch everything passing through. If a drain keeps blocking in the same spot once or twice a year, roots are usually why, and clearing it again will only buy you a few months.
Leaves and outside gullies
This one is an autumn job.
The gullies and grids round the back of the house fill up with leaves and silt, the water has nowhere to go, and the first heavy rain sends it across the path or into the house.
Two minutes with a gloved hand in October saves a callout in November.
How we clear a blocked drain
Drain unblocking in Pontefract comes down to two methods, and which one you need depends on what is in the pipe. We look first, because clearing roots the way you would clear a fat blockage wastes everybody’s time.
Rodding
Mechanical rods, for straightforward blockages near an access point. Quick, cheap, and enough for a good proportion of domestic jobs.
High pressure water jetting
For heavier build-up, fat, silt and root growth. Jetting scours the whole inside of the pipe rather than punching a hole through the middle of the blockage, which is the difference between a drain that stays clear and one that blocks again in six weeks.
Drains that keep blocking, and drain repairs in Pontefract
If a drain blocks twice in a year, the problem is the pipe itself rather than whatever went down it.
Clearing it again buys you a few months and fixes nothing.
The usual causes:
| What we find | What it means |
|---|---|
| Roots in a joint | They will come back.Needs the joint repairing or relining |
| A joint that has dropped or moved | Solids catch on the lip every time.Needs excavating or lining |
| A partial collapse | The pipe itself has failed.Needs replacing in that section |
| A length that has lost its fall | Water sits in it instead of running away.Needs relaying |
| Years of fat build-up | The pipe has narrowed from the inside.Needs jetting back to bare pipe, and what goes down the sink has to change |
If it keeps happening, a CCTV survey is worth doing. A camera down the pipe shows what is actually in there rather than guessing, and you get a recording rather than somebody’s word for it. The same survey settles an argument with Yorkshire Water about whose drain it is, and it is worth having before you buy a house with a history of drainage trouble.
Once a survey shows what is wrong we price the repair properly, whether that is patch lining a short defect or excavating and replacing a failed run.
Drain repairs in Pontefract are quoted in writing like any other job, before the digger comes anywhere near your garden.
Blocked toilets and blocked sinks
A blocked toilet is the most urgent of the lot, especially if it is the only one in the house. If the bowl fills up and then drains away slowly, the blockage is usually close by and easy enough to shift.
If it fills and stays there, or water comes back up when you use something else, the problem is further along the pipe.
Blocked sinks in Pontefract are nearly always the trap or the first few feet of waste pipe, and in a kitchen it is nearly always fat.
Boiling water and a plunger are worth a go before you call anyone.
If it clears and then comes back within a fortnight, there is a build-up further along that needs jetting rather than plunging.
What not to do
Do not pour caustic drain cleaner down it. It is the first thing people reach for and it is the wrong answer. On a fully blocked pipe it just sits in the standing water doing very little to the blockage, while it eats at older pipework and the seals. It also means whoever opens that pipe up gets a face full of caustic chemicals, so if you have already poured some in, say so when you call. It changes how we go about the job.
Do not keep flushing. If the toilet has not cleared after two flushes it is not going to, and every flush after that is a bucket closer to it coming over the rim.
Do not lift a manhole cover you cannot see into properly, and never leave an open chamber unattended if there are children or pets about.
Blocked drains in rented property
Blocked drains are where the argument about who pays usually starts.
If the blockage is caused by something wrong with the drain itself, roots, a collapse or a dropped joint, that is a repair, and under section 11 of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1985 it sits with the landlord. If it is caused by what has gone down it, usually wipes or fat, it tends to be treated as tenant use. In practice the two get argued over.
We attend, clear it, and tell you honestly which of the two it looks like, with photographs and a written sign-off for your file. If there is an argument brewing, a CCTV survey settles it, and that usually costs less than the dispute does. We deal with the tenant directly for access, so you are not stuck being the middleman.
Emergency drain unblocking
Sewage backing up into a property is an emergency and we treat it as one.
If you have searched for emergency drain unblocking near me, the line is answered by a person 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.
Stop using water in the property, keep everyone away from the affected area, and call 01924 266211.
More on how our out of hours work runs is on our emergency plumber in Pontefract page.
Drains we clear around Pontefract
We are at The Stables, Queens Avenue, Pontefract, WF8 4SF, and we clear blocked drains across Pontefract, Knottingley, Castleford, Featherstone, Ackworth, Darrington and Wakefield.
If you have searched for a blocked drain near me or drain clearance near me from any of those towns, we are a local firm with a real address a short drive away.
Keeping your drains clear
Bin the wipes, all of them
Let fat cool and scrape it into the bin rather than down the sink
Run a sink strainer in the kitchen and empty it
Clear leaves out of outside gullies and grids in autumn
Flush the kitchen waste through with a kettle of hot water now and then
If you have mature trees near the drain run, get a CCTV survey before the roots make the decision for you
Need a plumber?
Tell us what is wrong and we will come back to you with a free written quote.
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FAQ
Frequently Asked Questions
Clear, honest answers to the things people ask us most. If you can’t find what you need, just get in touch - we’re happy to help.