Chicago City Sewer Back up questions

[Ben Nantell]

Hey BP Team,

I have posted to this forum before about some main line sewer issues i've had since purchasing a triplex on the west side of Chicago. In 2020 I had 4' of main sewer line replaced, had ongoing issues after that. Was told there were issues on the city side of the sewer line, was then told by the city that the work had been done, I never saw anybody come or saw any torn up road for service, but I took the cities word for it. Since then I've had small backups in the basement unit, have had to rod out and jet the line probably 5-6 times in the last two years. 

Today I had the worst incident ever. From what my plumber told me the city sewer had backed up and forced my ejector pump to burn out as it dead headed against the back up. This failure resulted in 4 inches of water in the basement. I'm being told my home insurance policy will not cover any of the restoration and that in order to fix the solution for good I need to install a flood protection back flow system. This would require a new catch basin and new ejector pump in the front of the property and cost over $10,000. I'm struggling to comprehend the costs of the emergency plumber, restoration and then the new flood protection system. Well over $20,000 potentially and I've already spent about that trying to remedy the situation over the past 3 years. I'm told this has to do simply with the city sewers backing up into my mainline. 

Can someone please help me make sense of this, does this like a reasonable fix? Are the costs I've incurred standard rates or am I being given the price of someone who doesn't seem to know what they're doing? Is there any way I can get this work covered under my insurance policy? Does the city have any actual responsibility in this matter? My research tells me the city won't do anything but it seems that this issue keeps happening because of their backups? 

Any help in the matter would be greatly appreciated. I am meeting with a plumber on site on Thursday and would love to collect as much information as I can before that. 

Thanks again! Cheers - Ben

[John Warren]

@Ben Nantell that is terrible man. Not a fun issue to have at all. 

First of all, I would take a breath. Replacing a burned-out ejector pump is a $200 item versus putting in a 10k flood control system. There are also multiple types of flood control systems. One type involves having a vault with a mechanical system, and it is super expensive. The other type involves a check valve (think a big toiler flapper) and these are way less expensive. 

I would clean up the current mess with a cleaning person, throw a new ejector pump in for $200 and start looking at options here. 

When it comes to the city side, you would be suprised at the bad informtion you will get here. Someone in the forums likely has a guy who knows how to deal with this, and cities love to ignore issues like this since they cost a lot and are a pain to deal with. 

I had a client in Forest Park run into this where his sump pump and drain tile could never keep up, and after digging deep into the problem they ended up finding out that the city sewere was broken and ran next to his house. He literally had a storm sewer broken and draining into his basement. He was able to force Forest Park to deal with this. 

@Mark Ainley @Jonathan Klemm you guys know a plumber who can help?