How to tell if your heating oil tank has been filled as stated

Aliblahblah

Hello,
I am completely new to having to use Heating Oil for my home - our tank has just been filled on an auto fill set up with our supplier, I had a look inside the tank and it only looks to be just above half full. It is at least one foot from the top - is this normal? Or should it be full to the top when they fill the tank? Thank you

dogshome

I guess you picked up on useing an 'On Demand' supplier of heating oil from the previous owners of your new home, but I'm afraid that this is probably the most expensive way of buying oil from what can be a slippery industry - No pun intended

Heating oil cost is directly linked to World Trade crude oil prices which vary not just on the day, but parts of the day.
Forget the blandishments of "You'll never run out of oil", the real benefit is to the supplier who can charge top dollar on that days price and does not have to compete with other local suppliers.


The way to go is to search out Local Suppliers, ( Yell pages? ), for 4 at least, and phone all of them on the day for their price - It's not unusual that some of them will ask you to phone them back if you get a better price, so you can haggle.


There some areas that have a community 'Bulk Buy' scheme that researches the local prices, places an order with one supplier who's tanker does one run filling tanks - Ask your neighbors.


It seems that one problem you have is the capacity of your tank, which is rarely labelled - Again, ask neighbors - Don't be shy, oil fired home owners are usually very happy to to talk, or grumble, about their set-up

Ebe_Scrooge

What do you mean by "Auto fill" - did you ask them to fill the tank, or did you order a specific quantity ? Even a "fill-up" will not fill the tank to the brim, it's quite normal for there to be a gap left at the top. You should be able to estimate how "visually full" the tank should be by looking at the quantity delivered (on the invoice) and the size of your tank. For example, 1000 litres would pretty much fill a 1200 litre tank, assuming it wasn't bone-dry empty to start with. But it would only half-fill a 2400 litre tank.

If you've signed up for one of these direct debit schemes where the supplier comes and delivers oil when they want to, I'd advise against it. You'll normally get a much better price by shopping around and ringing a few suppliers each time you order. In my experience, the cheapest supplier one time may not be the next time. Indeed, I ordered some oil myself just yesterday. The supplier who has been consistently cheapest for the last 3 orders was actually the second most expensive this time.

Rodders53

What tank? Brand and model? Capacity? How much oil was delivered?

Tanks need some space left for expansion of the liquid when the outside temperature rises.

Some tanks have a special screwed filler port that is designed to stop the oil inbound at a certain level, but it reduces capacity by 5% and leaves a bigger space at the top of the tank. My supplier fills through the inspection chamber to do it by sight rather than use the port (probably fills much slower via it and requires an adaptor).

I foot measured from the outside top of a tall double-skinned (bunded) tank is significantly different from 1 foot from the inspection port of a short, very wide, single-skinned tank.