Brandon Gervais
1/5
Updating with new information. I will start with the good. Their customer service is very good, and extremely respectful. Not once have I ever had an issue with their customer support department.
Second, when you have a contract with them, they are very prudent with delivery. I called tuesday, got oil delivered today even with the holiday between.
If a simple user experience is worth extra costs to you, then perhaps this is the company for you.
Now for the bad, when you sign a contract, it will not be brought up by the sales agent, but read the bottom of the contract very carefully. "You will be liable to us for liquidated damages, if, among other reasons set forth in this Agreement,
you have not taken delivery of all of the Plan Gallons before the termination of this Agreement or
the expiration of this Agreement at the end of the Pricing Period.". In simple english, this means that if by the end of the contract you have not used all gallons of your plan, they can sue you for the rack price of all the gallons not used as well as any other damages they decide. While it is likely this clause is only invoked in agregious cases or cancelations, it is still a very dangerous clause for the consumer who has no way to accurately guess their fuel usage.
Next, the pricing. Its bad. Very bad. For my contract I had to pay $330 this year to be locked into a capped rate of $4.049/gal this may. This means to see any benefit the price would need to exceed $4.379/gal. Losing this initial deposit because the price doesnt go up is a risk the consumer takes. However, the current price for diesel is on average $3.49 per gallon as of this post. The average market cost of home heating oil is $3.353/gal as of this post, the rack price is $2.378/gal as of this post. My cost today for delivery was $3.859/gal. This does not include the $0.33/gal deposit to be on this plan. So at this point the $330 i paid for security has turned me into a hostage. I am being charged well above the average rate for fuel, well above even diesel price. I could go to a gas station and just buy diesel for cheaper, except for that clause i mentioned earlier, where I am liable for unused fuel.
I have already called customer support to ensure this is no error, they have already consulted their manager to figure out if theres any way they can retain me. Their best offer was $100 off my delivery of 281.6 gallons. This equates to my delivery being $3.50/gal, which is still more than the diesel price, and only for this 1 delivery. Diesel prices will need to shift by over $1/gal for this plan to make any sense, and even then some other companies would still be cheaper.
Next is the support contract. Again starting with the good, the indivduals who do service are very quick, efficient, and knowledgeable. They come out pretty quickly too.
That said, the bad. The contract is $760 yearly as of last december. So far ive had only servicing. I did have 1 part on my furnace break and need replacing, however I was charged for the part as the service contract didnt cover it. As such, I have been repairing things myself since its much cheaper. The service contract was convenient, but not worth the cost when most parts arent covered. Again, no complaints about the quality of service, but if im paying for the repair anyways, whats my $760 going towards?
This is the last year I will be with this company. I have been burned too many times. Im tired of paying for a support contract that covers nothing, and im tired of paying for the honors of them to locking me into a payment plan that ends up charging me well above diesel price, let alone market price. Ill be sad to lose the convenience, but it just isnt worth the cost to me. Not even close. Ill pay the $2.92 cents at other companies with no initial fee and just plan my refills at 1/4 tank to compensate if they cant deliver right away.
