Hopefully everyone had a great Thanksgiving break, and everyone is well and prepared for the holiday season since it is currently in FULL swing! This year has seemed to fly by- can you believe Hannukah has already come and gone, and Christmas is this Thursday?! On top of that we have had one of the coldest starts to December in almost a decade; December of 2010 just edged out December of 2025 for the coldest 15 day start. On that note, we will be here in office on December 24th this year. We will be closed on December 25th and December 26th, but we will be running our emergency service all day if you find yourself in need. As I am sure you know, to place an emergency call all you have to do is call our office line ( 703-369-5528 ) and let our answering service know you would like emergency service. They will then alert the on-call technician who will then get a hold of you and let you know when he can be at your home. Emergency service is a first come, first serve type of deal. Please keep in mind if it is late at night, or if the tech is already in route to a different home you might not receive service at that very moment. He will let you know when he can be at your home. As always, we try our best to handle the influx, but we just want to make sure we are all on the same page. Now let’s just keep our fingers crossed that everyone’s systems will act right for the holidays… right
Speaking of systems acting right, December had a very cold start this year, and we would like to thank everyone who has shifted their routine HVAC checkups to help accommodate our folks whose heat has gone out completely. It is not lost on us that you take time out of your day to wait for your tech to show up for your checkup- some may even take the day off. Please know we do appreciate you guys being flexible, and I can confidently say that the people without heat greatly appreciate it as well. We still have quite a few checkups to get in prior to the end of the cold season, so if you have not heard from us yet we will be in touch soon. Also, if you want to go ahead and get on the books you are more then welcome to shoot Becca an email or give us a call and she will get you squared away!
I am sure this past weekend when the temperature dropped to a daily average of the mid 20’s you noticed your systems working a little bit harder to meet that set point on the thermostat. For my heat pump gang, when the temperature drops that low unless you have a low ambient system the heat pump alone is not enough to keep your home nice and toasty. You will notice on your thermostat that your aux heat will kick on and it might have a longer run time then usual. Never fear, this is normal! Aux heat is your electric heat strips; sometimes refer to as emergency heat or supplemental heat, and they are designed to help your system get up to the set point on your thermostat. In fact, heat pump systems will kick on the aux heat when your home is about 2-3 degrees off from the set point of your thermostat no matter the temperature outside- it is the quickest way to get it up to temperature instead of running the whole system. You may notice a little bit higher of an electric bill because of this, but it should not be an astronomical amount. If your electric bill is 2 or 3 times higher then usual that is indicative of some sort of issue.
One last thing to note if you have a heat pump system is that when these units go into defrost you will hear it. The defrost noise is not a great sound, but it will end in a maximum amount of 15 minutes. You will hear it every time defrost kicks on.
If you have a gas furnace, you have a much simpler system without defrost or aux heat. If you notice your temperature dropping on your thermostat, you have a problem. For those on propane, just keep an eye on your fuel level; if your tank dips below a certain percentage you will not get enough fuel to your furnace to ignite.
And lastly, if you have a dual fuel set up with a heat pump and a gas furnace, your furnace will be operating as your aux heat. Depending on where your balance points are set will depend on when the system kicks on the gas heat.
Let’s talk about snow real quick- if it snows, do NOT cover your outdoor unit with anything. These units are made for the weather and obstructing the air flow in any way will cause it to stop working. If you really want to keep snow off your unit there are snow covers for certain models we can order for you. If you are interested shoot Becca an email and we can give you a price.
Speaking of, Becca now has a work cell phone. She is confirming appointments the day before with everyone if we have a cell phone number on file for you. You are also more then welcome to shoot her a text at any time if that is easier for you. Just note, she goes to bed early during the week- so if you text after 8pm you might not hear back from her until the next day Her cell phone number is 826-212-8168.
Hopefully this little insight into how these systems work puts you a little bit at ease if you notice something off on your thermostat or at your outdoor unit. We want to leave you with this last little tidbit of insight that has been said before, but holds enough weight to be repeated… Check your air filters! Check those air filters regularly- add it to every to do list you make It sounds excessive, but its not. You will thank us when you don’t have to schedule a visit only to find out it’s a dirty filter and that’s why the whole operation went kaput. Once a month at a minimum, friends.
We are getting the Q4 newsletter out pretty late this year, so apologies for that! It has been a crazy year and it seems like slowing down anytime soon is not in the cards for us. We are trucking along though and handling everything as best as we can. We appreciate the patience this past year, and with Dominic off the ground running and Geno not far behind 2026 will be much smoother we think.
We wish the best this holiday season, as well as a Happy New Year!
