Why is there water in the bottom of my fridge?

A pool of water in the salad drawer looks like a failing fridge. In almost every case it is a small blocked hole doing exactly what it should not.

Safety

What you'll need

• Cotton buds and a soft cloth
• Warm water and a small jug or syringe
• A spirit level, if you need to check it stands square

Step by step

1. Understand where the water comes from.A fridge continually forms condensation on its cold back wall. That water is meant to run down into a small drain hole and out to a tray above the compressor, where it evaporates.
2. Unplug the fridge.Before doing anything else. You are about to put water into a hole in the back wall.
3. Empty the bottom and find the drain hole.Take out the drawers and the lowest shelf. The hole is a small dimple in the centre at the base of the back wall, sometimes with a plastic peg sitting in it.
4. Clear the visible blockage.Cotton bud, gently. Food debris, a seed, a fragment of label — that is usually all it is. If there is a peg, lift it out and clean it.
5. Flush it with warm water.A syringe or a jug, slowly. It should drain away freely. If it backs up, the tube below is blocked rather than the hole.
6. Deal with an iced-up drain.If warm water stops rather than drains, there is ice in the tube. Repeated small amounts of warm — not hot — water will clear it. Hot water can crack the plastic.
7. Check the tray at the back.With the fridge unplugged and pulled forward, there is a shallow tray above the compressor. If it is overflowing or displaced, that is your puddle on the floor rather than in the fridge.
8. Test the door seal.Shut a sheet of paper in the door and pull. It should grip firmly. Anywhere it slides out easily is letting warm moist air in, which produces far more condensation than the drain can handle.
9. Clean and revive the seal.Warm soapy water in the folds, then dry. A hardened seal often softens usefully with a hairdryer on low held a few inches away, then pressed back into shape.
10. Check it is level and tilted back slightly.Most fridges are designed to sit fractionally lower at the front so water runs to the drain and the door self-closes. Adjust the front feet if it is level or leaning forward.
11. Look at what is going in.Uncovered liquids, warm food and wet vegetables all add moisture. Covering things and letting cooked food cool before it goes in makes a measurable difference.
12. Stop over-packing the back wall.Items pressed against the cold back panel block the run-off and hold water against the liner. Leave a gap.
13. Check how long the door stands open.In a warm or humid kitchen, a door held open while deciding what to cook puts a lot of moist air in. It is a genuine cause in summer.
14. Know when it is not a drain problem.Water only in the freezer, or ice building on the back wall of the freezer, points at a defrost fault. That is an engineer job rather than a cotton bud.

Tips

• The drain hole is the answer nine times out of ten. Look there before anything else.
• Warm water to clear ice in the drain, never hot. Hot water cracks the plastic tube.
• The paper test on the door seal takes ten seconds and finds the second most common cause.

Common mistakes

• Poking the drain with something sharp — A skewer or a wire punctures the drain tube or the liner, which turns a five-minute clean into a repair. Cotton bud and warm water only.
• Mopping it up repeatedly without finding the cause — The water keeps arriving, and standing water in the base eventually causes smells and mould in the drawers.

If it doesn't work