Sump Pump Repair

Two things decide whether a sump pump saves your basement: whether it runs when the power is out, and whether the water is allowed to go where you are sending it.

The gist

A sump pump that cycles every few seconds is usually not a failing pump, and where its water is allowed to go is set by your municipality rather than by a plumber. FEMA publishes a nine-step annual service and a one-minute bucket test that together settle most of it.

Source: FEMA, Maintain your Sump Pump.

Pit and Pump is a referral service, not a contractor. We connect homeowners with independent contractors. Contractors are required to hold whatever credential their state or municipality demands, and a discharge connection is usually a permitted alteration — ask to see the permit. We carry out no work, we sell no equipment, we do not set prices, and we never charge homeowners anything — the contractors in our network pay us when we route them a call.

Start here

Most sump pump advice is a buying guide. The two questions that actually cost people money are somewhere else entirely.

Where your discharge is allowed to terminate is a local legal question, and in a great many municipalities sending clear water into the sanitary sewer is unlawful and billed by the month. What the rule says and how to find yours.

Whether it runs in a power cut matters because the storm that fills the pit is the storm that takes the electricity out. The backup options, and the one that is not a backup.

The one-minute test

Pour a bucket of water into the pit. The pump should start, clear the pit and stop. That is FEMA’s own test, and it works because it exercises the float — the part that fails most and the part you cannot check by looking.

How to read each way it can fail, and the nine-step annual service FEMA publishes, including the ten-year replacement line.

Source: FEMA, Maintain your Sump Pump.

Before you replace a pump

A pump that starts and stops repeatedly is usually not a failing pump. It is the same water coming back down the pipe past a failed check valve — a component rather than the pump, and the one a whole-pump replacement often gets proposed over.

A pump that never stops is often not the pump either. Four causes, one of which is outside the house.

The part we play

We connect homeowners with independent contractors who cover their area, and the contractors pay us when we route them a call. You are never charged, and we would rather tell you the bucket test on this page than route you a call you did not need.

How that works in full, and where we route.

The full list

Done the bucket test?If the pump ran and cleared the pit, you may not need us at all. If it did not, or if you want the discharge looked at, we will route you to somebody who covers your area — the ZIP code is all we need to find them. Free to you. The line is not restricted to sump work; any plumbing job can go through it.

Call (888) 515-3188