HVAC Repair in St. Albans, VT
Homes here need heat from September through May and cooling from July through August. If your system quits, tell us what it's doing and a licensed contractor who covers Franklin County will get in touch.
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Nine months of heat, two months of cooling, and power that doesn't always hold
Your furnace is the machine carrying the load in St. Albans. It runs September through May, and on winter nights that average 11°F, it has to hold that line for hours at a time. Close to a third of homes here heat with fuel oil, and an oil furnace working that hard depends on a nozzle that stays clean and a burner that fires right every time. When it doesn't, you get soot, a furnace that short cycles, or one that won't start at all.
Summer asks less of the house. Cooling season is just July and August, with afternoons near 76°F, so an air conditioner that struggles or won't come on in that mild a stretch usually points to a real problem rather than the weather overworking it. Statewide, 21 percent of households went at least 24 hours without power in 2024, and a furnace with nowhere to draw power from goes cold along with the house.
- 9 months
- September through May, your system heats
- 2 months
- July through August, it cools
- 11°F
- the average winter night it heats against
- 76°F
- the average summer afternoon it cools against
NOAA nClimDiv, 1991–2020 normals
Vermont has no state license for HVAC contractors.
There is no state record to check here. Vermont does not test HVAC contractors and does not register them, so there is no license and no list of who does this work in Franklin County.
That means the repair on your heating and cooling system is not backed by any state credential. Nobody at the state level tested this contractor or has a file on them. Whatever confidence you have in the work will have to come from the contractor directly, not from a license behind them.
Source: Vermont Department of Public Safety, Division of Fire Safety
- Why is my heat not working?
- Start with the thermostat. Check that it is set to heat and the temperature is set above the room temperature, and change the batteries if it uses them. If the thermostat looks right, check the breaker for the furnace and the switch that looks like a light switch near the unit, since that shuts it off for service. A furnace that has no power at all, or one that runs but blows cold air, points to a problem a contractor needs to look at, especially with winter lows here averaging 11°F.
- Why is my system running but not cooling the house?
- Check the air filter first. A filter clogged with dust blocks airflow across the coil, and the system can run for hours without bringing the temperature down. Next check that all the supply vents in the house are open and nothing is blocking them. If the filter is clean and the vents are open and the house still is not cooling, the refrigerant charge or the outdoor unit needs a contractor to check it.
- What can I check before calling for HVAC repair?
- Check the thermostat settings and batteries, the breaker for the unit, and any power switch near the furnace or outdoor unit. Check the air filter and replace it if it is dirty, since a blocked filter can cause both heating and cooling problems. Look at the outdoor unit for anything blocking it, like leaves or ice. If the system still is not working after that, a contractor will need to diagnose it, and with 21% of Vermont households losing power for 24 hours or more last year, a reset after an outage is also worth trying before anything else.