A radon mitigation system was installed in the corner of my basement about 15 feet from my sump pump pit. The installers also sealed my sump pump pit to prevent the mitigation system from sucking air from inside my home instead of radon from the foundation. We just had a lot of rain, and I noticed that my sump pump is running a lot more than usual. It turns on every 15-20 seconds and runs for about 5 seconds each time, and it seems to me that the sump pump is struggling. Will the sealed system cause the pump to work harder? Is this bad? Is there any way of venting this sealed system without affecting the radon mitigation?

We hired a contractor to install a sump pump last year. During our vacation time, Hurricane Irene struck - is that what usually happens? After coming home, we found the basement was flooded because the sump pump didn't turn on as it was supposed to. We learned from our neighbour that power wasn't out so it wasn't electric failure. After some investigation, we found that the pump was not installed correctly. The float switch cord was left too long. While the water was rising, it got stuck at the side of the well so the pump never kicked in. Can't believe a simple twist or adjustment wasn't done by the contractor - it was complete malpractice. We contacted the contractor and he refused to resolve the matter with us. My question is we did not have a written contract and the work was done a little more than a year ago. Can we bring this to the court and is there any recourse since this was done a year ago? I can prove the pump failure by bringing my neighbour as witness since he was there when we cleaned up the mess. Please help!!!