First you have to find out why the smell is getting into the room. Often the cause is a dried-out trap — and you can fix that yourself in five seconds.
Anaerobic decomposition is always going on in a sewer system — organic matter breaks down without oxygen, producing a mix of gases containing sulphur compounds, ammonia and methane. That gas is always in the pipework, even in a brand-new building. The only thing keeping it out of your rooms is the water seal in the trap: water standing in the bend that gas cannot pass through.
All the commonest causes follow from that. The smell gets into the room when this water has gone, or when it is sucked out.
The second point explains a typical situation where the smell only appears in the evenings or at particular hours. That is not a random time — it is when neighbours use the most water. This symptom points fairly reliably to the ventilation riser rather than to your own plumbing.
If a smell has a clear daily rhythm, the cause is nearly always the riser, not your flat.
In a fair number of cases a sewage smell can be dealt with without any specialist. Check these before ordering anything:
| Check | What it means | Solution |
|---|---|---|
| A rarely used drain or shower | The water in the trap has evaporated | Pour in a litre of water |
| Smell after a longer absence | The same — the traps have dried out | Run water through every drain |
| Smell only under the sink | Possible leak at the trap or a joint | Plumber |
| Smell only in the evenings or at set hours | The trap is being siphoned because riser ventilation is weak | Property manager |
| Smell throughout the stairwell | A problem with the shared riser | Property manager |
| Smell after switching on the washing machine | Incorrect hose connection | Plumber |
The first item on the list is a particularly frequent cause: a rarely used floor drain or a second bathroom where the water in the trap has simply evaporated. Pour a litre of water in and wait a day — very often that is all it takes.
Older buildings in central Riga have one more common cause: a cast-iron riser with a corroded joint inside the floor structure. There the smell comes not from your drain but from the point where the pipe passes through the floor — often behind boxing-in or under the bath. That is fixed by a plumber, not by treatment.
To be clear: we do not clear drains or carry out plumbing repairs. If a pipe is blocked or damaged, that is a job for a plumber or an emergency service. If we ozone-treat a room where the smell keeps coming from the drain, you are paying for a few clean days.
Our work starts after that. We treat premises when:
If waste water has been in the premises, this is not only a question of smell — disinfection is needed. Waste water soaks into floor coverings, under skirting boards and into the bottom edge of plasterboard, and a biological process carries on there even after the surface is dry. More on this on the Disinfection after a sewage incident page.
There is also an honest limit here regarding materials. Porous coverings that have been in contact with waste water for any length of time — laminate underlay, carpet, the underside of soft furniture, the bottom 20–30 cm of plasterboard — usually cannot be saved by treatment. They have to be removed. Treatment makes them smell less for a while, but the material stays as it is.
The same symptom means different things in different buildings, and that saves time in the search.
The season matters too. During the heating season indoor air is dry and the water in a trap evaporates much faster — so in autumn and winter there are noticeably more “dried-out trap” cases. In summer heat, decomposition inside the system itself speeds up, so the same small leak smells stronger in July than in February.
And one more practical observation: after coming back from holiday the smell is almost always stronger. Two things work together — the traps have dried out over two weeks, and your nose has lost the background of your own home, so you register it again.
We confirm that the source has been dealt with — otherwise the treatment will be short-lived.
We treat the floor, skirting boards and surfaces that have been in contact with waste water.
Porous coverings that have soaked it up often have to be removed — treatment will not save them.
If waste water has been present, we disinfect the premises, not just remove the smell.
We clear the remaining smell from the room and the textiles.
Ozone treatment is always last in this chain. It handles the smell very well, but only once the source has stopped working: the trap is full, the leak repaired, the soaked material removed and the structure dried out.
Ozone treatment is €1.20/m², minimum €60. If waste water has been in the premises and disinfection is needed, treatment starts from €90 — we set the scope after an inspection.
No. That is a job for a plumber or a sewer emergency service. We treat the premises afterwards — disinfecting them and removing the smell.
This is often linked to pressure changes in the riser when neighbours use more water: the flow creates suction and pulls the water out of your trap. That points to a problem with the ventilation riser, which has to be dealt with at property-manager level.
It removes the smell that has already soaked into the room and its materials very well. But if the smell keeps coming from the drain, ozone treatment is only a temporary fix — the source has to be dealt with first.
Describe the situation — we will tell you whether treatment is needed at all, and which one.
Fill in the form — we will call you on the number you provide, ask a few clarifying questions and propose a solution.
Thank you! We will contact you on the phone number you provided shortly.
