Blocked Toilets Christchurch

A blocked toilet is the plumbing problem nobody can put off, especially in a house with one bathroom. Most blockages sit in the pan's trap or the first metre of pipe behind it, and they can be cleared in one visit without lifting the toilet.

We unblock toilets in homes, rentals, offices and cafés across Christchurch, Selwyn and Waimakariri. The first job is working out whether it is just this toilet or the drain the whole house shares, because the method and the price are very different.

Pricing: quotes are free, and every job gets a fixed price before we start, so there are no surprises on the invoice.

Blocked Toilets Jobs We Handle Across Christchurch

• Blocked toilet
• Toilet unblocking
• Toilet overflowing
• Toy stuck in toilet
• Toilet keeps blocking
• Toilet draining slowly

One toilet or the whole house?

You can usually answer this yourself. If one toilet is slow but the basins, shower and the gully trap outside are behaving, the blockage is in that toilet's trap or its short branch pipe. If the shower gurgles when you flush, a second toilet is slow too, or the gully outside is full, the blockage is further down in the shared line and our blocked drains service is the right call.

A single-toilet blockage is cleared at the pan. A whole-house blockage is cleared from an outside access point, often followed by a CCTV drain inspection to see what caused it. On flat land that moved in the earthquakes, repeat blockages are often a cracked or dipped drain rather than anything in the toilet.

What gets stuck in a toilet

The trap is a tight S-shaped bend cast into the porcelain. Anything bulky that does not break down lodges at the top of it. The usual culprits are:

• Wet wipes, including the ones labelled flushable
• Too much toilet paper at once, common with low-flow pans
• Sanitary products, cotton buds and dental floss
• Toys, toothbrushes and bottle lids
• Paper towels and tissues used when the roll runs out
• Hair ties and other things that fall in by accident

How It Works

Wipes, pump tanks and Christchurch sewers

Wipes are the most common thing we pull out of a toilet. They are made to stay strong when wet, so they catch at the trap or the pan connector and collect paper behind them. Further down, everything from the city's gravity sewers ends up at the Christchurch Wastewater Treatment Plant at Bromley, and wipes do not break down on the way.

Since the 2010 and 2011 earthquakes, some Christchurch properties, especially in the east and in newer subdivisions, have been connected to pressure or vacuum sewers instead of gravity pipes. A pressure system has a tank with a small pump on the property, and the pump is not built to deal with wipes, sanitary products or toys. If your house has a pump tank and an alarm box, keep the toilet to toilet paper only. Our wastewater pump stations page covers what to do if the alarm goes off.

How we clear a blocked toilet

We start with a toilet auger: a short, hand-turned cable inside a protective sleeve that goes round the porcelain bend without scratching the glaze. It breaks up paper and can hook out wipes and many solid objects. A plunger rarely shifts a toy; the auger usually does.

If the toilet clears but still drains slowly, we look at the branch pipe behind the pan with a camera. Packed paper, scale or fat in that pipe is cleared with a small jetting nozzle, and for heavy build-up in the main line our hydro jetting gear takes over. Older cisterns can use up to 12 litres a flush while modern dual flush suites use 6/3 or 4.5/3 litres, according to BRANZ's Level guidance, so a new low-flow toilet on an old drain can need a little more care with paper.

When the pan has to come off

Sometimes an object is wedged so firmly in the trapway that it cannot be pushed through or pulled back. A toy car, a toothbrush or a stone often sits crossways in the bend. Then we turn off the water, unbolt and lift the pan, remove the object from the outlet side, and refit it with a new pan connector so it seals properly.

While it is off we check the floor underneath. If the pan is cracked, the floor is soft, or the suite is old enough that replacing it makes more sense, we will tell you, and our toilet repairs team can fit a new one. A cistern that keeps running after all the flushing is worth fixing too: a constant trickle can push a Christchurch household over the council's daily water allowance.

Blocked toilet cost

The price goes up if the blockage turns out to be in the shared drain, if the pan has to be lifted and refitted, if a camera is needed to find the cause of repeat blockages, or if access is awkward, as with wall-hung and back-to-wall pans. We agree the price before we start.

Why Choose Cheeky's Plumbers for Blocked Toilets

Blocked Toilets FAQs

Blocked Toilets Across Christchurch

Our blocked toilets team works in every Christchurch suburb. Find your local plumbers:

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