Use Emergency Heat when the outdoor unit will not run and you need heat from the strips until someone looks at the heat pump. Leave it there and the outdoor unit stays off. The strips then carry the whole house. That is a lot of electric resistance heat for a desert night that a working heat pump could have handled. Switch back to Heat after the outdoor unit is able to run.
Auxiliary heat during a defrost is not the same switch. The heat pump ices, it defrosts, the strips may come on so the house does not go cold, and then they should turn off. A few minutes of “aux” on the thermostat can be that cycle. Aux that never clears, or Emergency that someone selected on the first cold night and forgot, is the thing to change or to report.
Cold air while Emergency is on means the strips are not heating. That is a repair, not a reason to keep toggling modes. The outdoor-unit side of a cold-air complaint is heat pump blowing cold air. Thermostat labels differ by brand; a photo of the screen helps. More thermostat checks are on thermostat problems.
Symptoms and how they’re checked
No price column. We are not publishing a cost per hour for electric strips.
| What you see | What it usually means | What to do |
|---|---|---|
| Thermostat stuck on Emergency, outdoor unit silent | The strips are the only heat, by design of that mode | If the outdoor unit can run, switch back to Heat. If it cannot, leave Emergency on and send the form. |
| Aux comes on for a few minutes, then goes off | Often a defrost | Let it finish. Ice should clear off the outdoor coil. |
| Aux or Emergency stays on all evening | Changeover set too high, outdoor unit not running, or the mode was left on Emergency | Note the outdoor temperature and whether the outdoor fan is turning. |
| Emergency is on and the vents stay cold | Strips not energizing | One breaker reset. If they stay cold, stop cycling the thermostat and ask for a repair. |
Name, mobile phone, and ZIP are required. Street address can wait. We follow up the same business day by phone or email. That is a callback, not a promise of a repair the same day.