when oil deliveries fail

johnny4

I'm usually a mild-mannered fellow, and I usually listen politely to arguments here on the relative merits of oil vs. gas. But my recent experience with a certain utility-owned fuel oil supplier based in Exton, PA (with local delivery "service" throughout mid-Atlantic area) has me decidedly on the gas side now.

Three times this winter, the supplier has failed to deliver oil to our 1000 gallon tank, so a steam boiler serving a small commercial building fails on lack of fuel, with the attendent hundreds of dollars of repair each time to clean & restart. I had to introduce the concept of automatic delivery to them in the fall. Then they went to a 2-week schedule but delivered on the 19th day (not the 14th), which was after the tank had been run dry. Then in the bitterest cold of winter they switched to a 7-day delivery schedule, but its the 9th day now and no fuel. Since they obviously can't count days on a calendar, I suppose it is way too challenging for them to count degree days, the traditional metric for automatic fuel delivery. I mean, degree days can go above 40, 50 per day! They don't have that many fingers and toes!

All the talk of fuel oil deliveries by your local, family-owned business is bunk. Consolidation in the industry has left the fuel oil business nearly as monolithic as the electric and gas utilities. At least the gas in the pipeline runs true 99.9% of the time. With oil, its a crapshoot.

ed wallace

oil deliverys

sorry to here about your problems with oil deliveries in ma. the utilities have not bought up oil co. at this time and hopefully will not what you should do is shop around for a new supplier a smaller co. that is independantly owned you did not say what utility owns the oil co. is it the gas co. if so what makes you think that their service on gas equipment will be better than their oil deliveries and if gas co. owns oil co. they want you to switch to gas where they have no competion

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Joe Grosso

Johnny

I am here to defend my industry.Frist I want to say I am sorry for the headaches that you have had this winter.I am the owner of a family fuel oil company and I have not had one runout this year with all my customers on automatic delivery.Having a 1000 gallon tank this inexcusable period.Like having one bad heating contractor does not make the whole industry bad.Please e mail me that I do know some good family fuel companies that will take care of you.

Tom M.

I agree with Joe.

An account the size of yours would be more than welcome to a small family run company. With the size and frequency of deliveries, you should be able to get a decent discount and the business you bring will be valued and appreciated.

Steamhead

If that's the company I'm thinking of

with the first initial of C, I've seen some bad performance from them in Baltimore too. Not all their people are bad, but the trouble is you never know who you're going to get.

Johnny, one of the nice things about oil heat is the choices you have. If you're using a supplier that falls down on the job, get some recommendations and switch suppliers! You can't do that with gas, and since gas companies are mostly deregulated now there really isn't any price-per-BTU advantage.

You really are better off with a locally-owned, family-run business. That's the kind of company I use. Too bad Carroll-Independent doesn't operate in your area- they do a great job.

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Bob Boltz

Heating Oil

Sorry you picked the wrong Company. I'm a 3rd Generation Fuel oil Dealer, we would love a good customer like yourself. With the monitoring equipment, that the better dealers have, this is not a problem. If you would like the name of a company in your area, just E-mail me. Being bigger does not mean better. When you fight the big boys, you try alot harder.

Eric

Oil tank size?

Maybe you need a bigger tank

Helgy

tank run out..

Maybe not a bigger tank, but a back up tank with a simular capacity. Plus the same delievery schedule you would never run out at least I hope not.

B. Tice

Time to look

for another oil company. 3 runouts is unexcusable. I'm sure there are many companies who could service your account properly.

Noel Kelly

Here's how it works.

You are so big that you have no relationship with your customer base. In fact your customer satisfaction is measured in gallonage. You lose gallonage and you buy some more (read: you buy up smaller oil companies).
BUT - unlike the gas company (read: UTILITY) the oil heat customer has a choice. I have been involved in the oil heat industry for years and I can attest to the fact that the family owned business will more than strive to meet your needs. Give 'em a shot but be sure to check their bona fides (read: are they part of a larger whole?).

Noel Kelly

Firedragon_4

You may want to read this too!

http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/033/business/Keyspan_ad_heats_up_debate_on_oil_vs_gas+.shtml

Mark J Strawcutter

choices with natural gas

I often hear "an advantage of oil is you can pick your supplier but you can't with gas". It all depends on where you live. Here in western PA, I have no choice for delivery (ie the gas pipelines) but I do have a choice in who supplies the gas itself and the price thereof.

Some commercial/industrial customers even have a choice of delivery companies.

Mark