SK5 · 2 miles from base
Blocked Drains in Reddish
Blocked drains and drain repairs across Reddish and SK5. Dense terraced streets, shared back-entry drainage, and twenty years of knowing whose pipe is whose.
Often within the hour. Reddish is the closest town to base.
Local knowledge
Drainage in Reddish
Reddish is terraced housing built for the mills, and the drainage was laid the way terraced drainage always was: one shared lateral running the length of the back entry, with every house on the row connected into it. That single fact explains most of what goes wrong here.
It means a blockage is frequently not yours. It also means it is frequently not your bill — a pipe serving more than one property became United Utilities' responsibility in 2011, and a great many people in SK5 are still paying private firms to clear drains that are not theirs to pay for. We will camera it and tell you whose it is before we quote to fix anything. The other local factor is the age of the clay itself: this stock is well over a century old, and open joints and root ingress from the entries and back yards are routine rather than exceptional.
Typical job
The kind of job we see in Reddish
- The problem
- Foul water surfacing in the back entry between two terraced rows, affecting several houses at once — and usually with at least one owner already holding a quote to replace their own back drain.
- What the camera usually finds
- A blockage well downstream of every affected property, often sitting against a partially collapsed section of old clay under the entry itself. No individual household's drain is the problem.
- How it gets fixed
- Jet what can be cleared to get the row draining again the same day, then produce a full survey report showing the collapse and exactly where it is. The run behind a terrace belongs to the water company rather than to the houses it serves, and that report is what gets it repaired without a householder buying a replacement they never needed.
What we do in Reddish
If the same drain in your Reddish property blocks two or three times a year, jetting is not the answer — the pipe itself is damaged. A camera survey will tell you which, and lining repairs it without digging.
Reddish — common questions
It is a shared back-entry drain — am I liable?
Almost certainly not. Since 2011 pipework serving more than one property has been United Utilities' responsibility, and nearly every back-entry lateral in Reddish is exactly that. We will confirm it on camera and give you the report to send them.
Can you get to a drain under the back entry?
Yes. Jetting and camera work are done through the existing chambers, and lining repairs go in the same way — no need to break up the entry, which matters when it is not your land to break up.
United Utilities have told me it is my drain. What now?
Get it on camera before you accept that. What decides it is whether the pipe serves more than one property, and a survey report showing the run continuing past your boundary and taking waste from the houses either side is the evidence that settles it — that is what to send them. Nearly every back-entry lateral in Reddish is a shared run. If the footage shows it genuinely is yours alone we will tell you that just as plainly, but a good many people in SK5 have paid for work they never owed.
Wondering whose drain it is, or what it costs? Both are answered here.
Blocked drain in Reddish?
We cover SK5 and the streets around them — 2 miles from base.