Posted: October 10, 2025
One of the most common questions we get asked from both new and existing customers of ours is a version of “When is my next delivery?” Or, “how do you know when to deliver propane to my tank?” Our goal is to hit the sweet spot between showing up too frequently (no one wants a bobtail backing into their driveway every two weeks to deliver propane!) and risking a run out situation.
For most residential purposes, the target delivery timing is when your tank gets to around 30% remaining. A common analogy to this is driving your car down the road – most of the time, it’s pretty silly to stop when your gauge reads ¾ full, but right around ¼ tank or less is generally when it’s a good idea to stop for fuel. However, the difference between that scenario and delivering propane is twofold – number one, your gauge in your car shows you exactly how much is remaining (whereas a lot of the time we are working off of projections/estimation, so there’s a much wider margin of error), and number two, we’re bringing the gas to you – not vice-versa.
So without knowing exactly what your tank is reading, how do we, the propane company, know when to send a truck to our autodelivery customers? There are three main systems in place to help us show up at the right time, and often, we use them in combination with one another to make the most accurate guess possible.
A lot of our consumers are very predictable when it comes to their propane consumption. These customers are typically using propane for cooking, drying, and water heat – applications that stay the same year-round, on a week-to-week and month-to-month basis. These situations are very easy to predict usage for. To go back to the car analogy: if you drive 10 miles every single day at the same speed in the same traffic conditions, you’ll probably know exactly when to stop and fill up!
However, when it comes to pure propane consumption, many more gallons are used for heating in the wintertime than cooking, drying, and water heat – it’s just a fact of life that we can get some bitter cold winters here on the Eastern Shore. Our software has those delivery patterns covered, too. The computer takes into account the temperature outside versus your past winter delivery patterns and updates your projected tank percentage daily based on those factors. While not perfect, many of our degree day customers end up being within a margin of ±5% between what is forecasted and how many gallons of propane get delivered to them when we show up.
Finally, with modern technology, there is a third solution which is essentially a cheat code – the remote tank monitor. This bridges the gap between situations where fill weekly or degree day options are both not good fits. Typically, these are our “less predictable” consumers – think pool heat, generator, and even fireplace users. These items are either habit or event-driven: a power outage leading to the whole house generator kicking on, a Labor Day pool party, and a date night at home in front of the fireplace are all more unique circumstances, versus the daily showering, laundry, and cooking routine.
Remote monitors will provide a live reading of your propane tank gauge directly to our software in the office every day, and even alert us if there is a steep drop or aberrant usage. While eventually one day in the future, we’ll have monitors for all of our tanks in the field, as of now, it’s still a niche category due to the logistics of installation (cell service is critical for data transmission) and some physical limitations (not all tanks can have remote monitors installed).
We pride ourselves at Callahan’s Gas in being your local, dependable, and accessible propane company, and use a slew of tools, software, and techniques on a case-by-case basis to ensure your tank is filled at the right time. The final piece of the puzzle is our team – the people at work to dispatch, deliver, and take care of your propane needs every day.
Contact us or stop by today to learn more about our automatic propane delivery services!
