N.S. customers frustrated with heating oil delays
Rebecca White wants answers.
She went without heat in her Kennetcook, N.S., home for over 75 hours during one of January's winter storms.
“It was very stressful and very upsetting,” White says.
White's home uses heating oil and she is set up with Irving Oil for automatic oil tank fill-ups. That means Irving should monitor her usage and fill her tank when it's close to empty without her having to order more. According to Stats Canada, 36 percent of Nova Scotians use fuel oil to heat their homes, making up the largest share of residential heating energy in the province.
On Friday, Jan. 28, she and her husband noticed their house was getting cold. When they checked their oil tank, it was empty. White called Irving and was told someone would come fill the tank that day, but no one showed up.
“Overnight, the temperature dropped to 10 degrees Celsius inside the home,” White says.
The next day, the winter storm was so bad that no trucks could be on the roads.
“My husband ended up having to go out in the middle of the storm and get just enough oil to carry us over,” White says. “The only thing we have is our oil furnace. So, we would have been in big trouble if we hadn't managed to get out and get the oil in the tank. It was either that or freeze.”
After more calls and more promises through the weekend, someone came on Monday, Jan. 31 to fill the tank.
“I have to say, Irving really dropped the ball, and we were really disappointed in the service,” White says, “It was really not acceptable.”
White isn't the only one. Lisa Spinny-Hutton has been a customer of Irving Oil for 10 years and never had a problem with their service until recently. She also has automatic fill-ups with Irving for her home in Upper Tantallon but noticed an indoor chill on Thursday, Jan. 27.
“The lady on the phone said the technician was coming with emergency oil and then an oil truck with a person will come,” Spinny-Hutton says.
But the truck never followed the emergency oil. She and her husband have a young daughter and had to bring her into their room to keep her warm overnight.
“It's really cold outside. I have a five year old, and there's a storm coming. I was panicking,” Spinny-Hutton says. “The oil truck pulled up on Friday night, and I cried.”
White and Spinny-Hutton were just two of many Nova Scotians posting on social media about their problems with automatic oil delivery in recent weeks.
“I feel bad for the people that I've been seeing on Twitter,” Spinny-Hutton says. “There are people that are going through the same thing and some of them went through that storm and their oil never got delivered.”
Irving spokesperson Candice MacLean told the CBC that Irving isn't experiencing an oil shortage. She says they've been affected by the pandemic and weather, which has in some cases resulted in longer wait times.
While they both received a credit or discount from Irving for their trouble, White and Spinny-Hutton wanted better communication from Irving about the delays.
“I think that Irving should let people know what the issue is,” White says. “Why were so many people running out of oil who are on autopay? Why was this happening? I wish that Irving would explain that to us.”
Spinny-Hutton says she pays extra for the automatic fill-ups so she doesn't have to monitor the tank, but it doesn't work if the company never shows up.
“My biggest issue was that if Irving had been upfront with his challenges, then we would have gone earlier on to get fuel for the furnace to tide us over or made arrangements so that we weren't left panicking scrambling at the last minute.”