The 1930s semis here were built fast on clay, and the shallow runs under the long gardens have moved with the ground for ninety years. A survey finds the dropped joint that keeps catching debris, and it is the first thing to do before building over the run.
A CCTV drain survey is exactly what it sounds like: we put a camera down your drains and watch, in glorious detail, what four decades of plumbing decisions look like from the inside. To be clear, we would do this bit for free. It’s the best television in the trade. Narrating a drain run like a nature documentary (“here we see the fatberg in its natural habitat”) is a professional perk.
What you get is the useful part: a plain-English report of exactly what’s down there, where it is, and what (if anything) actually needs doing. No jargon without translation, no invented “urgent works”. If the drain is healthy, the report says so.
When a survey earns its money:
- Repeat blockages. If the same drain keeps blocking, something structural is causing it: roots, a dropped joint, scale, or a slumped section. The camera finds the cause, so you stop paying to treat the symptom.
- Buying a house in the TW area. Much of the local stock has original clay drains from the Victorian era or the 1930s. A £250 survey before exchange can save you a £3,000+ excavation after. Lenders and insurers increasingly ask for one.
- Landlords and letting agents. A dated survey report is clean evidence of drain condition between tenancies.
What it costs: a standard domestic survey runs £150–£350 depending on how much drain there is to inspect, and homebuyer surveys with a full written report start around £250. Fixed price, agreed before we start. If the survey finds something that needs fixing, the survey fee is credited against repair work we do, so you never pay twice to learn the same fact.
What to do right now in Worcester Park
- A survey is a planned visit, not an emergency. If water is actually backing up right now, call us about the blockage first.
- Have a rough idea where your manholes or inspection covers are. If you don't know, that's fine, finding them is part of the job.
- Buying a house? Book the survey before exchange, not after. A collapsed drain is the buyer's problem the moment you own it.
CCTV Drain Survey help, local to Worcester Park
A 1930s suburb on a hillside above the Hogsmill: steep runs that scour themselves and flat ones at the bottom that never do.
Worcester Park, KT4, is a 1930s railway suburb that climbs from the Hogsmill valley up to Cheam, and from a drain’s point of view the hill is the whole character of the place. Runs on the slope have a good fall and tend to look after themselves. Runs in the valley bottom along Central Road and towards Old Malden are flat, silt up quietly, and are the first to back up when the Hogsmill is high and the surface water system is full.
The houses themselves are the familiar interwar story: long gardens, shallow clay runs, and ninety years of clay-soil movement opening the joints. A dropped joint catches debris, roots find it, and the blockage returns on a schedule until the joint is found and lined. The camera finds it in minutes, and the survey is also the sensible first step before the extension that half of KT4 seems to be building.
We would always rather reline than dig here. Worcester Park gardens are long and well kept, and a trench fifteen metres down the lawn to reach one joint is exactly what relining exists to avoid. We cover Worcester Park and Old Malden around the clock.
We cover all of Worcester Park (KT4) — from Central Road, Worcester Park station, the Hogsmill River and across New Malden, Cheam, Stoneleigh. Being genuinely local means we already know what Worcester Park's drains are made of, and how fast we can be at your door.More about drains in Worcester Park →