When Should I Use Emergency Heat?

What emergency heat actually does

Emergency heat is your backup. When you switch to it, the system stops using the outdoor heat pump and heats with the electric strips alone.

That keeps the house warm if the heat pump cannot.

It is meant for when the heat pump is down, not for normal winter days. Because it runs the strips full time, it uses a lot of electricity.

Think of it as a way to stay warm for a day or two until a technician fixes the real problem.

• It heats with the electric strips, not the heat pump.
• It keeps the house warm when the heat pump is down.
• It uses a lot of electricity.
• It is a short-term backup, not a daily setting.

When to switch it on

Turn on emergency heat when the heat pump clearly stops making heat. Good reasons are an outdoor unit that will not run, a unit iced solid, or air that stays cold while the house keeps dropping in temperature.

In those cases, emergency heat keeps your family warm and your pipes safe until repair. It is the right call during a Frederick cold snap when waiting in a cold house is not an option.

• The outdoor unit will not run or has failed.
• The unit is iced solid and not heating.
• The air stays cold and the house keeps dropping.
• You need warmth and safe pipes until a technician arrives.

Emergency heat vs auxiliary heat

People mix these up, but they are different. Auxiliary heat turns on by itself to help the heat pump in deep cold, then shuts off.

The heat pump still does most of the work, so it is more efficient.

Emergency heat is something you choose. It shuts the heat pump off and runs the strips alone, which costs more.

Use aux heat as normal automatic backup, and save emergency heat for when the heat pump is broken.

• Aux heat: automatic, helps the heat pump, more efficient.
• Emergency heat: manual, skips the heat pump, costs more.
• Aux heat is normal in deep cold.
• Emergency heat is for when the heat pump is down.

Why you should not leave it on

Running emergency heat for weeks gets expensive fast. The strips use far more power than the heat pump, so a long stretch on emergency heat can shock you on the next bill.

It also hides the real issue. If the heat pump is failing, emergency heat just masks it while the problem sits unfixed.

Use it to stay warm, then book a repair so the efficient heat pump comes back online.

• Long use spikes your electric bill.
• It masks a heat pump that needs repair.
• Switch back to normal heat once the unit is fixed.
• Treat it as a stopgap, not a season-long setting.

How we help in Frederick

If you had to switch to emergency heat, the heat pump needs a look. Call for emergency heat pump repair and tell us what the outdoor unit is doing, whether it is iced over, and how cold the house got.

We get the heat pump working again so you are not stuck running the costly strips. In a hard freeze, do not wait it out in a cold house, since same-day help keeps your home and pipes safe.

• Call when you have to run emergency heat.
• Tell us what the outdoor unit is doing and how cold it got.
• Same-day help keeps your home and pipes safe in a freeze.