What should I do if my heating oil or LPG runs out in cold weather?

Off-grid heating has no safety net: when the tank is empty the heating simply stops, usually on the coldest night, and a delivery is days away rather than hours. There is also a mechanical consequence. An oil boiler that runs dry draws air into the fuel line and often into the pump, and running it repeatedly on an empty tank can damage the pump. LPG has its own quirk — a cylinder can appear empty in very cold weather when it is simply too cold to vaporise.

Safety

What you'll need

• Your supplier's emergency number and account number
• Electric heaters, and the electrical capacity to run them
• Warm bedding and layers
• The number of an OFTEC or Gas Safe registered engineer
• A carbon monoxide alarm

Step by step

1. Ring the supplier and ask for an emergency delivery.Ask explicitly — the standard lead time and the emergency service are different products. Say if anyone in the house is elderly, very young, unwell or has a medical need, because most suppliers prioritise on that basis.
2. Ask about a smaller top-up if cost is the problem.Many suppliers will deliver a smaller minimum quantity, and some areas have oil clubs or hardship funds. Local authorities and Citizens Advice can point at winter fuel help, and it is worth ringing before the house is cold.
3. Heat one room and shut the rest down.Pick a room that is small, has few external walls and can be closed off. Electric heaters are expensive but survivable for a couple of days; heating a whole house electrically is not.
4. Never bring outdoor heaters or barbecues inside.Patio heaters, barbecues, camping stoves and unflued paraffin heaters all produce carbon monoxide. This is the single most dangerous thing people do when the heating fails, and it is what kills.
5. Protect the plumbing.Leave internal doors open where it is safe to do so so warmth reaches the pipe runs, open the loft hatch a little, and run each tap briefly a couple of times a day. If the house will be cold for days, consider draining down.
6. Check on anyone vulnerable in the house or nearby.Cold homes are dangerous for older people and anyone with a heart or lung condition. Extra layers, hot drinks, a hot water bottle, and a warm room for the day are the practical answers, and NHS 111 if anyone becomes unwell.
7. For LPG, check whether it is empty or just cold.A cylinder or tank in very cold weather may not be vaporising fast enough to run the appliance. If the gauge shows fuel and the cylinder is very cold, that is the likely cause — never warm a cylinder with any heat source.
8. After an oil delivery, expect to bleed the line.Air in the fuel line stops the boiler restarting. Bleeding is a job for an OFTEC engineer on most installations, and repeatedly pressing reset without bleeding can flood the combustion chamber.
9. Let the tank settle for a while after a delivery.A delivery stirs up whatever was at the bottom of the tank. Waiting an hour or two before firing up lets sediment settle instead of being drawn straight into the filter.
10. Prevent the repeat.Fit a working gauge or a telemetry monitor, set a reminder to check weekly through winter, and set an order threshold at a quarter of a tank. Almost every run-out is a monitoring failure rather than a money one.

Tips

• Suppliers prioritise deliveries for households on their vulnerable customer list, and joining costs nothing. Ring and ask to be added before you need it.
• An oil-fired range or boiler that has run dry may need the filter changing as well as bleeding, because the last of the tank is where the sludge is.
• Electric heaters are around three to four times the running cost of oil per unit of heat. Heating one room for two days is fine; heating the house for a fortnight is a bill people remember.
• If you are on a heat pump or storage heaters as backup, run them properly rather than as a token — a heat pump left on a low flow temperature for days is far cheaper than fan heaters.
• Keep a couple of spare LPG cylinders where the supply is bottled rather than bulk, and change them over before the first is fully empty.

Common mistakes

• Repeatedly pressing the boiler reset on an empty or freshly filled tank — It pumps air, can damage the pump and can flood the combustion chamber with unburnt oil, which is then a fire risk on ignition. Two attempts, then an engineer.
• Using a gas hob or oven to heat a room — It is unflued combustion in a living space and produces carbon monoxide. It is also a fire risk. This is never an acceptable heating method.
• Waiting to see whether the weather improves before ordering — Cold weather is exactly when lead times stretch. Ordering at a quarter full costs the same per litre and takes the emergency premium out of it.
• Warming an LPG cylinder to make it work — Applying any heat to a pressurised cylinder is extremely dangerous. If it is not vaporising, the answer is a larger cylinder, a bulk tank or a change of cylinder, not heat.

If it doesn't work

Questions people ask