Soakaway problem

[gness]

I have a double drive which slopes down to the garage and house. There is a drain at the point where the drive levels out, about four feet from the house, which leads to a soakaway...now blocked.
The guy who tried to unblock it thinks the soakaway may be under the part of the garden I have just slated and planted up. I really don't want to dig that up!
That would also mean the water was going uphill from the drain to the soakaway. Could that be right? Could the soakaway be in the strip of flat garden so close to the house?
Any expert thoughts on how I can remedy this please?

[The Builder]

Gness, the rule for as long as I can remember, is for soakaways to be sited at least 4.5m from the building. I guess it's a fairly recent house. The usual thing was to get the digger to excavate a big hole, then fill it with stone, bits of brick etc.
The fact that the area rises, just means that the hole had to be dug even deeper to allow the inlet pipe to fall to the soakaway.
Nowadays, concrete chambers with an inspection cover on top are often used instead.
One possibility is to use an hydraulic "mole".......... the kind of thing used to "tunnel" a new gas supply to a house without having to dig anything up. Otherwise, there would have to be some excavation to find where the pipe run enters the soakaway.

[gness]

Thank you builder. If it's that far from the house it's going to be very deep as it's a steepish slope. The house is thirty years old. One of the drives is a horrible, quite new crazy paved one....laid by an intoxicated novice I think so I will perhaps think about having that redone sooner than I was and seeing if we can sort out a new soakaway somehow. Many thanks. x

[The Builder]

If the drive is that bad, Gness, think about installing a new soakaway under the drive............ quick, easy job for a digger......... then put new drive on top :o)

[tonyav]

Please tell me you won't be handling a Kango, gness.

[gness]

Sounds like the best option Builder. Thank you. x

[gness]

I have stripped cemented tiles from a kitchen with a Kango and dug a swimming pool with a lovely hired digger Tony. Most of us lived to tell the tale and the plasterer will soon be off the crutches. x

[tonyav]

LOL, I just knew it, maiming involved again !