These days there are lots of options when it comes to choosing your off-grid fuel supplier. You can spend days trying to weigh up the pros and cons of each. One thing you soon realise is that whether your home runs on heating oil or LPG, not all suppliers were created equal. The problem is that it might not be apparent straight away, but you soon notice their flaws when you start using them. Then, it can sometimes be a case of better the devil you know. Or worse still, you’re stuck in a contract and have no option to switch suppliers.
In our latest blog, we’re going to take a closer look at how we at Northern Energy work harder to always deliver more.
Award-winning service
Here at Northern Energy, we pride ourselves on giving a level of service that others can’t match. We’ve a long and established history of providing excellent service levels based on a simple, yet important rule – we always put our customers first.
It’s why when you call us, you’ll talk to someone in our head office who knows their stuff and cares about a job well done. We don’t use a big external call centre run by people reading from scripts. Also, we have our own highly experienced delivery team. Many of our drivers have been with us for many years and know their routes like the back of their hand. Which makes a big difference, as they don’t just get to know where you are, but how best to reach you, especially in bad weather. All this means that we deliver your fuel on schedule as promised. By drivers who are courteous, friendly and helpful.
We really do care, and thanks to our ongoing commitment to not just maintaining the highest standards of service, but continually raising them, we were awarded a prestigious Feefo Platinum Trusted Service Award. This is only given to a select few companies who have already earned a Gold Trusted Service Award for three consecutive years.
Always competitive prices
Getting a great price for your heating oil or LPG has always been an important factor when it comes to choosing your supplier. As global prices have steadily gone up over the last few years, this has become more vital than ever before.
We believe in always giving our customers the best price possible, whether it’s ordering one delivery of domestic heating oil to top up their tank or joining us on an LPG contract. In addition, we also create competitive pricing packages that help you budget ahead while delivering great value. For example, we have our Premium Package which can be tailored to your needs. It gives you 2 pence off every litre of fuel (which all adds up), the flexibility to pay a fixed monthly amount and a free upgrade to our Premium Heating Oil which is more efficient and reduces the chance of boiler breakdowns.
We’ve also created our Flexi Saver Plan for heating oil users which lets you save as little or as much towards your next bill, with anything left over going towards your next bill. This helps avoid the worry of big winter heating bills. Plus, we include a free upgrade to our Premium Heating Oil that makes every penny go further.
And if you're an LPG user, we pay the VAT on all your deliveries!
An ever-growing range of services and benefits
We’re always working hard to improve and refine the range of services we offer. This might be by adding something new, like our Flexi Saver Plan that launched in 2022, or offering the latest technology to make your life easier, like the OilFox Smart Monitor that helps you to keep an eye on your heating oil 24/7.
We’re also always investing in the latest equipment to ensure we’re working as effectively and efficiently as possible. This might be updating our delivery vehicles to more efficient options or upgrading our systems so that that everything is running smoothly behind the scenes to ensure your order arrives seamlessly.
Championing environmental issues
As an independent company, we’ve always been passionate about doing what’s best for our planet. Our office recycles as much as possible, and we insist on using energy-saving devices at all times.
We also take care to reduce our environmental impact in other areas of our business. For example, we carefully plan out each day’s deliveries so that every possible mile of travel that can be saved, is saved, to cut down on emissions.
In addition to reducing our own carbon footprint, we also help our customers be greener by providing help and advice on ways to save energy and reduce their fuel bills. Which in turn saves them money. We also offer Carbon Offsetting, so every time we top up your tank with our Premium Heating Oil or LPG, we’ll automatically offset the CO₂ emissions from your fuel. It’s our first important step towards helping each and every customer improve their carbon footprint.
Cleaner, greener energy solutions
New, cleaner forms of heating oil and LPG are just around the corner such as HVO (Hydrotreated Vegetable Oil) which can reduce CO2 emissions by 90% and can be used in your existing boiler heating system. For LPG users, there’s renewable gasses such as BioLPG and rDME (renewable dimethyl ether). Both are what's called 'drop in' solutions that work with your existing heating oil or LPG boiler and let you heat your home while being greener.
We’re looking forward to offering these greener options as soon as they become affordable alternatives. Which, looking at current plans for their production, will be sometime soon. Rest assured, we are keeping a close eye on their evolution.
Supporting our staff and local communities
Northern Energy is a family-run business with family values. We believe in looking after our staff and treating them with the respect they deserve. This is one of the reasons our team stay with us and provide such an amazing level of service. For example, some of them have been with us for over 25 years. We also offer excellent training schemes so that everyone can improve and expand their expertise for the sake of our customers.
We value our position in the communities where we operate and do all we can to help. For example, we’re passionate about raising money for charities and good causes. Like our yearly charity golf event with has raised over £100,000 since we started it. It’s something we’re very proud to host and has become a highlight of our calendar.
Going above and beyond
We’ve talked about all the different areas where we think we shine compared to the competition. But there’s one which burns the brightest and that’s our dedication to providing service that is always over and above the norm. A great example is a few years ago on Christmas Day, a customer rang saying that they’d woken to discover that they’d mistakenly run out of fuel! Our Chairman, Howard Illingworth picked up the call. Luckily, he has an HGV driver’s license and lives near our head office. He jumped in one of our delivery vehicles, headed over there, and before you could say “Ding-dong merrily on high”, he'd delivered the fuel to the customer. Thanks to his commitment for putting customers first, Christmas Day was saved.
We hope you’ve found this list of reasons to choose Northern Energy enlightening. And, if you’ve any questions or would like to know more, please do get in touch. We like nothing more than chatting to customers, especially prospective ones. Just give us a call on 01423 770 666 for heating oil, or if you use LPG, it's 01423 772 789.