Townsend Energy

Townsend Energy, in Danvers, runs on two engines: keeping oil and propane tanks full and sending crews out for furnace, boiler, and heat-pump work when something breaks. Google puts them at 4.7 stars across 497 ratings, and a couple of long-time customers put real years behind that number — one says they've been on a service contract for over 30 years, another since 2003, back when the company was still Federal Energy before it merged with Townsend. The last six months tell a mostly reassuring story with a few real cracks in it. A heat-pump and mini-split installation was described as stress-free from estimate through completion, a furnace that died the night before a storm was running again within about ninety minutes thanks to a repairman named Brian, and an oil truck reached a nearly empty tank within 45 minutes of a Sunday-storm call. When one tech's tune-up caused a new problem, the company fixed it without charging twice. But three of the sixteen reviews from this stretch describe real friction: slow response paired with dispatchers customers found unpleasant, an oil tank that ran dry overnight despite being on autopay delivery, and a customer who couldn't get an itemized breakdown after a $447 plumbing repair. Plumbing shows up almost as often as HVAC in the reviews. Recently, a technician named Mike got singled out for a water heater install that turned up unplanned upgrades and handled them without extra fuss. That pattern of named technicians getting credited for water heater, disposal, and valve work runs back through years of reviews, not just this stretch. Pricing is the one theme that recurs across the years rather than just recently: some longtime customers have said oil and propane rates run above market and that the company wouldn't budge on a reduction, even while praising the actual service. That's worth raising directly before signing an oil or propane delivery contract. For a furnace that's down or a tank about to run dry, Townsend's response holds up on the record here, and the plumbing side backs it up for smaller jobs too. Before booking, ask for an itemized quote up front, and if switching to their auto-delivery, confirm how they handle usage spikes during a cold snap — that's exactly where two of the recent complaints started.