Oil Theft

Overthrow

Hi there,
We filled the tank for around €600 in the beginning of December. Tonight, the radiators went cold, dipping the tank showed that it's almost empty. :mad:

We couldn't have used that much in a month. So I'm wondering if anyone has heard about oil theft going on around Greystones?

Thanks

pixbyjohn

Its surprising how much oil you go through in this cold wet weather.
How many hours a day do you have your heating on?

Annasopra

There was a spate of it 2 years ago

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=70002911

Overthrow

pixbyjohn wrote: »

Its surprising how much oil you go through in this cold wet weather.
How many hours a day do you have your heating on?

Not many. From Sept to Dec we only used around €250 worth of oil, so the usage from Dec to Jan would had to have been around 8x the previous months usage which is crazy.

Maudi

Overthrow wrote: »

Not many. From Sept to Dec we only used around €250 worth of oil, so the usage from Dec to Jan would had to have been around 8x the previous months usage which is crazy.

are you and end house?hows the potential access for getting to your tank?have you the cap locked?is there an alarm on it??if it has been robbed and if the security of the tank or access is lacking they will be back...

dpofloinn

Overthrow wrote: »

Hi there,
We filled the tank for around €600 in the beginning of December. Tonight, the radiators went cold, dipping the tank showed that it's almost empty. :mad:

We couldn't have used that much in a month. So I'm wondering if anyone has heard about oil theft going on around Greystones?

Are you sure that you don't have a leak?

Overthrow

Maudi wrote: »

are you and end house?hows the potential access for getting to your tank?have you the cap locked?is there an alarm on it??if it has been robbed and if the security of the tank or access is lacking they will be back...

Plenty of access. No lock on the tank (yet), or alarm.

bido

Overthrow wrote: »

Hi there,
We filled the tank for around €600 in the beginning of December. Tonight, the radiators went cold, dipping the tank showed that it's almost empty. :mad:

We couldn't have used that much in a month. So I'm wondering if anyone has heard about oil theft going on around Greystones?

Thanks

I would say that you used the oil, you say it's almost empty if someone stole the oil it would be empty.
At this time of year it is not surprising the amount of oil you use.:D
700 litres of kerosene costs €634.25

Overthrow

bido wrote: »

I would say that you used the oil, you say it's almost empty if someone stole the oil it would be empty.
At this time of year it is not surprising the amount of oil you use.:D
700 litres of kerosene costs €634.25

There's still some oil in it, but only enough to leave a mark on the dipstick at the 'empty' point. Besides, we used the last bit tonight before the rads knocked off!

loobylou

I find I use way more than normal over the christmas period, The house is occupied so much more.

Rasmus

Overthrow wrote: »

Hi there,
We filled the tank for around €600 in the beginning of December. Tonight, the radiators went cold, dipping the tank showed that it's almost empty. :mad:

We couldn't have used that much in a month. So I'm wondering if anyone has heard about oil theft going on around Greystones?

Thanks

If you filled in the beginning of December that is almost seven weeks. If you have the heating on a lot it's not hard to run through oil that quickly. I have done it before (won't make the mistake again!) by leaving the heating on for hours thinking there was loads of oil. As 600 euro used to buy a lot of fuel (even get you through a winter) is it possible that you thought it was going to last longer than it did?

snowman224

€600 would fill just slightly over half a tank, given a normal 1100L tank..... but I'm guessing you meant there was already a good bit in there before or?

Cerco

OP,
If you don't know for sure the best thing is to forget about it.
Check around and make sure there is no leak then put a lock on your tank or even tie a piece of string on to the cover (if you are concerned about tank being damaged by thieves). This way you will know in future if anybody interferes with it.
Posters here can only speculate on what happened. I have not heard of any oil thefts lately.

Overthrow

snowman224 wrote: »

€600 would fill just slightly over half a tank, given a normal 1100L tank..... but I'm guessing you meant there was already a good bit in there before or?

No, the 600 was put in after the tank reached the empty point. For us to use the oil, it would have meant approximately 8 times the amount of usage we had done in the previous months. This just isn't realistic at all, which makes it more likely in our opinion that there's something wrong with the tank or that someone has stolen the oil.

We got a statement from the oil company showing all the orders put in and there was a similarly odd high usage over 2 months in the Spring/Summer, when the heating wouldn't have been used much at all.

pixbyjohn

Do you check the level of oil in the tank when it has been delivered?

Wicklowandy

Heard of some thefts october november in rathdrum and avoca areas, apparently they're stealing marine bilge pumps From moored boats(very strong) so they can pump through narrow hose from over 200ft away.

But 600l of kerosene isnt as much as you think over a 7 week period of heavy usage, if your boiler isnt at full efficiency.

If they robbed you, it would be rare not to spill a tell tale amount, and rarer for them to leave the tank as they found it (ie top on, tap not broken, no hole in side of tank)

miller50841

Get 1 of these
http://www.oiltankalarms.ie/

Overthrow

Wicklowandy wrote: »

Heard of some thefts october november in rathdrum and avoca areas, apparently they're stealing marine bilge pumps From moored boats(very strong) so they can pump through narrow hose from over 200ft away.

But 600l of kerosene isnt as much as you think over a 7 week period of heavy usage, if your boiler isnt at full efficiency.

If they robbed you, it would be rare not to spill a tell tale amount, and rarer for them to leave the tank as they found it (ie top on, tap not broken, no hole in side of tank)

Maybe it happens a lot more than people realise because of those who take an extra few seconds to put the lid back on! If the lid was discovered to be off and the tank empty it's blatantly obvious that it has been stolen, but it doesn't take a genius to realise that leaving things as you found it makes it more likely you can come back for a 2nd tank full.

We dipped the tank after it was filled the last time, and it was well above the amount that it took to drop the tank to empty previous to that over a 3 month period.

Wicklowandy

Seen a good few tanks robbed and never seen such careful thieves! Maybe yours are special;)

Even if they put the lid back on, there would still be tell tale splash from taking the hose out, and dragging the hose, reeling it up etc. If you cant find that on your property, or in the likely place a vehicle was parked with a tank, i'd feel its very unlikely you were robbed:)

matt-dublin

don't forget for the last 8 weeks that the temperatures have been very cold, this would mean your boiler would consume more oil / work harder to get up to the temperatures you've set it to.