To be terrified about the cost of oil

[Troublesometooth]

We don’t have any mains gas, heating and hot water both run on oil. We usually buy 500 litres every 8 weeks in winter which costs £200-300.

We are desperately low and the cost today is £700! We simply can’t afford to pay this to heat our home for the next 8 weeks.

Other than wearing more jumpers can anyone suggest ways of keeping warm?

I've just checked - you are right. It's gone up £83 since yesterday 😱

Do you have a local oil club? If not, get one set up. It takes a little coordination (and someone has to be willing to do the leg work of calling suppliers) but it can create good savings

Goff petroleum just quoted me 107.95… might be worth shopping around some of the smaller firms? Some of our local garages also sell heating oil in smaller amounts

Sorry to interject with my ignorance but why don’t you have central heating etc? Why are you so dependant on oil?

The central heating runs off an oil boiler - just like for some people it runs off gas or electricity or a heat pump.

I'm the same - some kind of blind luck had me fill up with 1000litres just as it all started, so I'm good until October now (I use one tank full over winter, one for the rest of the year - big house, but well insulated.)

www.screwfix.com/c/heating-plumbing/oil-filled-radiators/cat7230008

Plug in oil filled radiator temporarily? Have to heat main room and move around

For future. The oil filled wall mounted electric radiators might be an option, combined with solar? The solar will keep the electric bill down, and they are fairly efficient. Especially if old house that other options won’t work well in.

@Strawberryjellyicecream - I’m not in uk, but most houses have always run main central heating off oil until recently. Gas only available in some main cities.

Our area has now added communal biomass system the last few years where waste wood is burnt and hot water at high pressure pumps through the roads like gas pipes do. You can only connect if the pipes run past house though, they added our street last year. So we will move onto.
But again, most areas still don’t have this

Do you have any fires or woodburners?
Now it’s getting warmer you might be ok without central heating. The plug in electric blankets/throws are great for when you’re watching tv or going to bed

And sympathies. We have half a tank and were debating yesterday whether we should top up whilst we can still get oil at least. But have decided to hold fire and see if the craziness dies down, turn down/off heating and switch to our immersion heaters for hot water if necessary

Our oil boiler pack-up at the end of the first lockdown and we had an Airsource heatpump fitted, and are on a fixed electricity tarriff until May, so at least we will have until the Autumn before the heating becomes a concern.

I'd be very worried about oil theft, if the price has gone this high.

Lets hope for a nice warm spring.

I can sympathise - we are in the same boat. Bought Sat and it was £529, The week before I checked it was £400, We too have a 500l so you can't just buy bulk when cheap. I'll be turning the heating off next week and probably boil a kettle for the washing up. Have you checked boiler juice - they are sometimes cheaper? Apparently some accept Klana the pay later option too and some of the smaller garages round here are selling smaller amounts. It's awful xx

For some of the people asking why you don't have gas etc...it's never made it's way to this part of Devon!

Can you turn the heating off in all rooms but your living room? Stay in one room more? Do you have a fire? Get out more, walking, moving around? Trips to libraries etc?

I discovered the legal min order is 500litres something to do with trading standards.

I think oil should be included in energy price cap.

@Strawberryjellyicecream there are quite a lot of houses in the UK that do not have mains gas. We have to use oil, LPG (delivered by a lorry to a tank) or heat pumps.

We pay more for our heating. We also pay more for electricity as we can't get dual fuel discounts. If I lived 1/4 up the road I'd be on mains gas but they won't bring it down the road.

We're on oil heating too, so I feel for you. I placed an order yesterday for 600 litres and paid £1.27 per litre for it (£805.00 to save you doing the maths) ... its terrifying. I'm just glad we're coming into the warmer weather because this pricing is unsustainable.

For reference for those who don't use oil to heat, in early 2020 we were paying 26.8pence per litre. The price rise has been astronomical!

I'm experimenting with candle heaters. They do keep the chill off so worth looking up on You Tube.

Worried about oil theft too

So many stupid questions! We have oil because that is the only option. There is no mains gas. The house is well insulated (EPC B) but it's big, detached, and we have an Aga as our only cooker (it came with the house; don't suggest changing it - that's a very long term strategy). We use about 4,000 litres a year ...

We only heat the minimum of rooms. We are in a village co-op for bulk buying oil but even last Friday suppliers were refusing to quote. We have about 10 days of oil left and bought 500litres last Friday in the hope that there is a bit of settling over the next 2-3 weeks; could be a costly strategy.

OP - no advice but huge amounts of sympathy.

Why do you need the heating on all day, surely you can let it run for a while then take it off.

The price of oil atm is shocking. Check a few of your local filling stations and see if they have any of the plastic Jerry cans you can fill (think roughly 30l fits in one.) You can buy heating oil (kerosone) at some filling stations. You'll pay more per litre than if you were filling your tank using the oil man, but short term it may help if you don't have the money for 500l. We have 2 Jerry cans and have done this on occasion when our oil has been running low but haven't had the cash there and then for a huge amount. Usually gets us through a couple of weeks.

Price are astronomical at the moment - it was expensive when we bought just over 3 weeks ago and the cost is now double what we paid. Some of the bigger suppliers have a monthly pay account - could something like that help spread the cost a little?

We ran out of oil once, I having been in hospital with DS, just before Christmas so couldn’t get a delivery until after Christmas.

Luckily we had an open fire in one room and we lived in there for the fortnight keeping the fire going all day. We brought DS’s travel cot in the room and we slept on the sofas.

Not suggesting anything that drastic though!

Can you manage in the day with jumpers etc, and just put it on in the evening?

I paid 61ppl on Feb 3rd and I thought that was hugely expensive. Boiler Juice price just now is £1.29 pl!

We're semi rural, ten minutes from a major NW city but also on oil.
I've just turned the heating off.