Answered 24/7 · before the season, not during it
Sump pumps, in a region with a high water table and no basements
The pump, the float that starts it and the discharge it pumps into are tested as one system, because the pump is almost never the part that failed first.
- CFC1433655Florida plumbing contractor license
- Pump, float, dischargetested as one system
Why would a South Florida property need a sump pump?
Not for a basement, because there are none here. What a sump pump protects in this region is any part of a building that sits below the surrounding grade in a place where the water table is already close to the surface: an elevator pit, a below-grade garage or ramp, a mechanical room, a crawl space under an older raised house, or a low point in a site that fills faster than it drains.
That changes what failure looks like. In a basement a failed pump is a wet floor. In an elevator pit it is a flooded shaft and a lift out of service, and in a below-grade garage it is water rising against a wall with no gradient to take it anywhere.
It also changes the maintenance argument. A sump pump only matters on the days it runs, which here means storm season, and the useful time to test one is in March rather than in September.
What you are seeing
The four ways a sump system fails
Only one of them is the pump.
The float is stuck
The commonest failure by a distance. The pump is fine, the switch that tells it to start is not, and the first anybody knows is when the pit is full.
The discharge is blocked or disconnected
A pump that runs and runs while the water level does not move is pumping into something that is not taking it. Check where the discharge goes before condemning the pump.
It runs constantly
Either the check valve is letting the discharged water fall back in, or groundwater is genuinely arriving faster than the pump is rated for. Those are very different answers.
It has never been tested
A pump that sits dry for a year can seize. In a building where the pit protects an elevator or a mechanical room, that is worth a scheduled test rather than a surprise.
Questions
Straight answers before you call
How do I test a sump pump?
Pour water into the pit until the float rises and the pump starts, then watch that the level actually drops and the pump stops on its own. That single test covers the float, the pump and the discharge, which are the three things that fail.
My pump runs all the time. Is that bad?
It is worth diagnosing rather than living with. A failing check valve lets the water it just pumped out run back in, so it pumps the same water repeatedly. The other possibility is that groundwater is arriving faster than the pump is sized for, and that is a different fix.
Do I need a backup?
Where the pit protects something expensive, it is worth considering, because the water arrives during exactly the weather most likely to take the power out. That is a judgement about what is below grade rather than a rule.
When should this be looked at?
Before storm season rather than in it. A sump pump only matters on the days it runs, and testing one in March is a scheduled visit while testing one in September is an emergency.
Related work
What sits alongside a sump system
Usually the same conversation about water and grade.
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Pit filling, or a pump that has never been tested?
A person answers at any hour, and the float, the pump and the discharge get tested as one system rather than one at a time.
No obligation. Work performed under Florida plumbing contractor license CFC1433655.