the Cost of Septic Tank Cleaning

We have a fairly new house and have a septic system for our sewer waste. We have never had it cleaned and was under the impression that as long as we treated the septic system, we would be fine if we had it cleaned every 5 years or so. We have a small family of 4 and don't use excessive amounts of water. We use the additive that help promote a healthy septic system and thought we would be all right. We realized about 3 years into its use that we needed to have it cleaned when our toilets started backing up.

One night we returned home one evening we noticed a foul odor from the bathroom on our ground floor. When I looked into it, I saw sewer water was backing up through the drain in the shower stall. I tried to plunge it, but could not lower the level. I called a local septic cleaning service and they arrived a few hours later. Once the removed the cover to the septic holding tank, they told me that the tank was completely full and needed to be pumped out. They also said that since I did not do this every 2 years, I had an excessive amount of material and that there would be an extra charge because they had to flush the system. The whole pumping and flushing took about 3 hours to complete. The charge was higher than normal because of all of the extra work. They did a great job and were clean and professional.

I have since learned that the average septic system needs to be cleaned about every 2 years to keep it running correctly. If you let yours go any longer, the septic material can overflow the holding tank and flood the leech field with solids and clog the pipes. This could result in a very expensive repair to clear out the leech pipes. You can also monitor how well your system is doing by finding the cover to the holding tank and looking inside to see the current level. If it is more than half of the way up, call to have it pumped.