I was on a boat the other day with an automatic pump ( recently installed) that has some kind of chip that senses back pressure when the pump activates. The pump switches itself on every so many minutes. If it senses pressure, it stays on, if it doesn't, it switches off. Someone commented that he had fitted a similar pump along with a counter. The number the counter registered the first night scared him half to death -- until he remembered the "auto" system. Problem with that type of sensor, you don't know how many of the 196 times the pump ran were for real!
Don't know the mfr of the pump.