The Vulnerable Household No Heat or No Water Escalation SOP

Purpose

When an infant, an older adult or a person who depends on medical equipment is in a home without heat or water, the risk is not the broken equipment but the hours before it is fixed. This procedure guarantees three things on every such call: the household is prioritized from the first phone call, nobody is left overnight with an unsafe improvised fix, and a named adult owns the plan when the shop cannot restore service the same day. Without it, these calls are handled like any other no-heat ticket, and the failure is a baby in a 55 F room or a grandmother heating with a gas oven.

Scope

Covers residential calls where the household includes a child under 12 months, an adult 65 or older, someone pregnant, or someone using home oxygen, dialysis, a powered bed or mattress, or refrigerated medication; and where there is no heat in cold weather (outdoor below 40 F, or indoor below 64 F) or no running water.

Does not cover: a medical emergency on arrival (see related: The Medical Emergency on a Service Call SOP); a planned shutoff in a home with medical equipment (see related: Planning a Shutoff in a Home With Medical Equipment); the payment question (see related: No Heat in January and the Customer Cannot Pay); a customer the shop cannot reach at all (see related: The Welfare Check Request SOP).

Roles and responsibilities

Procedure

1. Screen at booking (CSR). On every no-heat or no-water call, ask three questions before scheduling: who is in the home (any infant, anyone 65 or over, anyone pregnant, anyone using medical equipment), what the thermostat reads right now, and what they are doing to stay warm or get water. Acceptance: all three answers typed into the ticket and a priority set: P1, tech on site within 4 hours, for any vulnerable occupant with indoor temperature below 64 F or no water. Wrong / stop: if the caller cannot read the thermostat, treat it as P1. If anyone is drowsy, confused, shivering uncontrollably or hard to wake, stop booking and tell the caller to hang up and call 911 now. Hazard: none to the CSR, a desk step; the hazard you are screening for is the improvised heat source, which is why question three is mandatory.

2. Give phone guidance before dispatch (CSR). Read the household the short script: gather everyone into one room and close its door, layer clothing and blankets, keep an infant's sleep area free of loose blankets, and if using an electric space heater, use one with tip-over and overheat shutoff, plugged directly into a wall outlet (never an extension cord or power strip), with 3 ft clear around it, switched off when nobody is awake in the room. Never use a gas oven or range, grill, camp stove or generator indoors for heat. For no water: bottled water at one gallon per person per day, and no open flame to thaw a pipe. Acceptance: the caller repeats back "no oven, no grill, heater straight into the wall." Wrong / stop: if they say they are using the oven, a grill or a generator inside, they turn it off and open a window while still on the phone; if anyone has headache, nausea or dizziness, everyone goes outside and calls 911. Hazard: carbon monoxide (CO) at the customer's end, controlled by the script; none at the desk.

3. Arrival check (tech). Before touching equipment, switch your personal CO monitor on at the truck and carry it in; sniff for gas at the door; read the indoor temperature; and look at each vulnerable occupant. Acceptance: living-space CO below 9 parts per million (ppm), no gas odor, every occupant alert and able to talk normally, and the indoor temperature written on the ticket. Wrong / stop: at 35 ppm or above (the shop's evacuation default, set from the NIOSH exposure limit), everyone leaves, nothing electrical is switched, and you call 911 and the gas utility from outside. Between 9 and 35 ppm, ventilate and find the source before any work on the heating. Gas odor: everyone out, no switches, call the utility from outside. An occupant who is confused, slurring or very cold to the touch: 911 before anything else. Hazard: CO and gas, handled by the monitor and the evacuation rule above; your own exposure is why the monitor goes on before the door opens.

4. Restore service today if you can (tech). Diagnose and repair to full safe operation with stock on the truck or a same-day supply-house run. Acceptance: for heat, the system runs through a full cycle with every safety control proving, a combustion check normal for the appliance, CO in the living space still below 9 ppm, and indoor temperature rising at least 2 F in the first 60 minutes; for water, flow at every fixture you opened and no drip at the repair after 15 minutes under pressure. Wrong / stop: if the part is not obtainable today or the appliance is unsafe to run, stop and phone the office manager before leaving the property, then go to step 5. Hazard: at light-off, stand to the side of the burner compartment, not in front of it, and keep the CO monitor at the appliance during the first cycle; when repressurising a water line, open the valve slowly with your face away from the joint you repaired.

5. Set temporary measures if service is not restored (tech). For heat: one electric heater per occupied room, each on its own wall outlet, on a circuit with nothing else drawing; a 1,500 W heater pulls about 12.5 A at 120 V, most of a 15 A circuit, so two heaters on one circuit will trip it or overheat the wiring. Test the home's smoke and CO alarms with their test buttons. For water: confirm at least 24 hours of drinking water in the home, and for a dialysis or formula-dependent household, call the provider or a family member about supply. Acceptance: each heater on a dedicated circuit with 3 ft clearance, a smoke alarm and a CO alarm that both sound on test, and the indoor temperature of the occupied room written down after 30 minutes. Wrong / stop: no free circuit, no working CO alarm when any fuel-burning appliance remains in service, or the occupied room still below 64 F after 30 minutes means the home cannot be made safe tonight, and you go to step 6 for relocation. Hazard: fire and overheated cord; feel the plug and outlet after 15 minutes, and a warm plug means unplug it and move the heater.

6. Escalate and decide (office manager). On the tech's call, decide one of three: stay with the temporary measures, relocate to a named place (family, friend, warming center via 2-1-1), or call 911. For a utility disconnection with a medical device in the home, tell the household to ask the utility about a medical certificate. Acceptance: a named responsible adult on the phone agrees the plan before the tech leaves, and for relocation, the destination address is written in the ticket. Wrong / stop: if no responsible adult can be reached and the occupant cannot be kept warm safely, call 911 and stay on site until responders arrive. If an adult who seems to understand the risk refuses to leave, record the refusal and set follow-up within 12 hours; if they do not seem to understand it, call adult protective services after the 911 question is settled. Hazard: none from the desk; for the tech still on site, if the conversation with family turns hostile, leave and complete the call from the truck.

7. Follow up (office manager). Call the household by 9 am the next day, and again after the repair. Acceptance: a person reached by phone who reports the indoor temperature and that everyone is well, written in the ticket with the time. Wrong / stop: two unanswered calls an hour apart go to the named emergency contact, then to the welfare-check procedure. Hazard: none, a desk step.

The record this produces

The ticket carries: screening answers and priority code (step 1); guidance given and the repeat-back (step 2); arrival CO, gas check, indoor temperature and occupant condition (step 3); repair result and verification readings (step 4); heaters placed, circuits used, alarm test results, room temperature at 30 minutes (step 5); the decision, the named responsible adult and any destination (step 6); follow-up time and result (step 7). The office manager reviews every P1 ticket weekly, and any 911 or protective-services call is flagged to the owner the same day. A dispatcher reading this ticket a month later should be able to tell exactly who was in the house, how cold it was, and who agreed to what.

Worked pass

Step 1. Tuesday, 6:10 pm, outdoor 18 F. A mother calls: no heat since afternoon, a 4-month-old in the house, thermostat at 59 F, using "a little heater." P1 set: vulnerable occupant, below 64 F.

Step 2. The heater turns out to be plugged into a power strip. She moves it to the wall outlet and repeats back the line. Tech dispatched, ETA 8:00 pm, inside the 4-hour window.

Step 3. Tech arrives 7:50 pm. CO 0 ppm, no gas odor, house 57 F, mother and baby alert. Pass.

Step 4. The furnace control board has failed. The replacement board is at a supply house that opens at 7:00 am. Fails acceptance: not restorable today. Tech calls the office manager at 8:25 pm.

Step 5. The nursery and the main bedroom share one 15 A circuit, already carrying the mother's heater and a dehumidifier; the only other free circuit is the kitchen. The CO alarm in the hallway is missing its battery. Room temperature after 30 minutes with one heater: 60 F. Fails three ways: no dedicated circuit for the bedrooms, no working CO alarm, room below 64 F. Stop rule taken: the home cannot be made safe tonight.

Step 6. The office manager reaches the grandmother, 15 minutes away, who agrees to take mother and baby overnight. Destination written in the ticket at 9:05 pm. Tech unplugs the heaters before leaving.

Step 7. 8:40 am next day: mother reached, family well. Board installed at 11:30 am; house at 66 F by 1:00 pm, confirmed on the second call.

References

• World Health Organization, Housing and Health Guidelines (2018), recommended minimum indoor temperature of 18 C (64 F) in cold seasons.
• U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, portable heater and carbon monoxide safety guidance.
• NIOSH recommended exposure limit for carbon monoxide (35 ppm), basis of the shop evacuation default.
• See related: The Medical Emergency on a Service Call SOP; No Heat in January and the Customer Cannot Pay; Planning a Shutoff in a Home With Medical Equipment; The Welfare Check Request SOP.