Most Often Asked questions by Rice Energy Customers
Q. Does Rice offer 24 hour service?
Yes, Rice Energy has servicemen on call 24 hours a day, so no matter when you have a "No Heat" call, Rice will respond as soon as possible!
Q. Does Rice offer Senior discount?
Yes, Rice does offer a senior discount. Check them out here!
Q. Does Rice offer service contracts?
Yes, Rice offers Comfort service plans, see the detail here!
Q. Does Rice offer automatic oil delivery?
Yes, Rice will keep track of the degree days, your oil comsumpion rate and will deliver to your home when you need it. Let Rice take the worry out of remembering to check the oil tank level! See more in next question.
Q. Many customers, especially those who are new to oil heat, wonder how the automatic oil delivery system works. We are often asked, "How do you know when I need more oil?"
Our Degree Day monitoring system ensures that your oil is delivered automatically when you need it, taking delivery off your mind. The easiest way to explain it is to use the example of your car and how it uses gasoline. Your car has a rating of how well it uses gasoline, known as the miles per gallon (MPG). If your tank holds 20 gallons when it is full, and you multiply that by the fact that you get 25 miles to the gallon, then you know that you can travel 500 miles. Your house and heating oil work the same way, and since we don't have access to your tank gauge, we have our Degree Day system which uses the same formula you would use if your gas gauge broke. We know how much oil is in your tank when it is full, and we multiply it by the "miles per gallon" of your house, which is known as the K-factor. This tells us "how far" your house can go before you need more oil. In our business, "how far" is not measured in miles, it is measured in something called "degree days". Degree days are an indication of how cold it was on any given day, and the National Weather service gives us degree day information every morning. So after we fill your tank, we keep track of the degree days every day to make sure that we deliver you more oil when you need it, and keep you warm and cozy.
Q. What if it is cold in your house?
If your oil burner fails to operate, these are a few simple things you can check yourself before making a service call.
#1: Is your thermostat set above room temperature?
#2: Is the emergency switch in the "ON" position? (switch with red cover plate, usually located at the top of your basement stairs, or at the entrance to your furnace room)
#3: Do you have oil in the tank?
#4: Is there a tripped circuit breaker or blown or loose fuse?
#5: Press the Reset button on relay ONCE ONLY. The reset button is usually a small button located on top of your oil burner or on the stack switch.
CAUTION: If you are not familiar with the operation of this device, please contact our service department without delay.
If the burner still fails to operate after checking each of these steps, please call for service. MA-413 773-3693 or 800-RICE-OIL .
Q. What is Rice's tank protection?
Tank Protection is Rice's way of preventing your oil tank from leaking due to corrosion. Just once a year Rice will add this product to your tank when oil is delivered and you are protected for a year!
Q. What is Puron and where is it used?
Bryant Air Conditioning units use Puron...the environmentally safe refrigerant that won't harm the ozone layer! It is proven reliable, Over 200,000 systems installed!