How it works
Sixty seconds on the form, no account, no call centre.
We pass it straight to a licensed drain plumber who works your suburb.
Free quote, no obligation. You deal with the plumber directly from there.
What a blocked drain usually costs
Most standard blockages across the Adelaide Hills clear for between $150 and $400. If tree roots are involved, or the plumber needs a CCTV camera to find the problem, expect $350 to $900 for the camera inspection and jet blasting together. A collapsed or root-broken pipe that needs relining is a bigger job, usually $3,000 and up. The full cost guide breaks down every scenario.
Sewer, CWMS or septic: the Hills question first
Most blocked drain advice written for Adelaide assumes every house is on a mains sewer. In the Hills that is simply not true, and it changes what a blockage means and who you call.
Three systems run side by side up here. Newer estates around Mount Barker, Littlehampton and Nairne are connected to mains sewer. A string of townships, among them Woodside, Lobethal, Birdwood, Gumeracha, Charleston and Mount Torrens, run on a council community wastewater management scheme, usually shortened to CWMS, where each property has its own septic tank and the settled effluent flows out to a shared council line. Outside the townships, and on plenty of older blocks in places like Mylor, Basket Range, Cherryville and Forest Range, the property has a full septic system with its own soakage or irrigation area and no connection to anything.
Stirling, Aldgate and Bridgewater sit in the middle. They are leafy, older, large-block suburbs where some properties are connected and a good number are still on a tank. If you do not know which you have, your council or SA Water can confirm it, and it is worth knowing before a plumber arrives.
What the plumbers we refer do, and what they do not
The licensed plumbers we connect you with clear blocked drains. That covers the drains inside the house, the line from the house to a septic tank or CWMS connection, and the line out to a mains sewer connection where one exists. They camera lines, jet blast them, cut roots and reline damaged pipe.
Pumping out or desludging a septic tank is a different trade. That work goes to a licensed liquid waste contractor with a tanker, and if your tank is simply full, that is who you need. A drain plumber can tell you quickly whether you have a blocked pipe or a full tank, which is often the first useful thing anyone says to you.
Why Adelaide Hills drains block
The Hills are hard on drainage. Much of the older cottage stock in Stirling, Aldgate, Hahndorf and Lobethal still runs earthenware clay pipe with a joint every metre, and the big established trees on these blocks, oaks, elms, liquidambars and natives alike, push fine roots into every joint that leaks. Leafy blocks also mean leaf litter, and autumn fills gutters, downpipes and surface pits faster than anywhere on the plains.
Winter is the real test. The Hills get far more rain than the city below, and steep driveways funnel water straight at houses. Wet ground also draws roots and loads septic soakage areas, so a system that copes all summer starts backing up in July. Add steep blocks, long pipe runs and rock close to the surface, and a Hills drain has more places to go wrong than a flat suburban one.
A licensed drain plumber clears the blockage, then tells you honestly whether it was a one-off or whether the pipe, the tank or the soakage area needs attention.