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Furnace Not Working After FortisBC Changed Your Gas Meter? Here's Why
If a FortisBC technician was just at your house to swap out your gas meter, and now your furnace won't fire up or your hot water tank has gone cold, you're not imagining things. This happens more than people expect, and there's usually a straightforward explanation.
Why This Happens
FortisBC is in the middle of a multi year project to upgrade roughly a million gas meters across the province to newer wireless models. In Maple Ridge and the rest of the Lower Mainland, a lot of that work gets scheduled through the fall and winter months, though exchanges without an appointment happen through spring and summer too.
To swap the meter, the technician has to shut off your gas supply. Turning it back on isn't as simple as flipping a switch. Every appliance connected to that line has to be checked and relit safely, and by law, only a licensed gas technician is allowed to do that. If nobody was home, or if an appliance didn't relight properly on its own, you're left with no heat until someone qualified comes back to sort it out.
What Might Actually Be Wrong
A few things typically explain the no heat problem:
A pilot light that didn't reignite on its own. Older furnaces and water heaters sometimes need a manual relight after the gas has been off, and newer units with electronic ignition can occasionally fail to sense the restored supply.
A valve that didn't fully reopen or reseat. This is common enough that it's one of the first things a gas fitter checks.
Less commonly, a fitting disturbed during the meter swap that's now letting gas escape slowly rather than flow where it should.
That last one is the one to take seriously, because it's the difference between an inconvenience and a hazard.
How to Tell the Difference
If you smell something like rotten eggs, stop what you're doing. Don't flip switches, don't light a match, don't try to troubleshoot the appliance yourself. Get everyone outside and call the FortisBC emergency line at 1-800-663-9911, or 911. That smell means gas is present somewhere it shouldn't be, and it needs an emergency response, not a maintenance call.
If there's no smell at all and it's simply that the furnace or water heater isn't running, that's a job for a licensed gas fitter to come out, check the appliance connections, confirm there's no leak, and get the pilot or ignition system working again.
Why You Need a Licensed Gas Fitter, Not a Quick Fix
Gas work in BC is regulated for good reason. A technician who isn't certified through Technical Safety BC isn't legally allowed to relight your appliances or sign off that a connection is safe, and getting it wrong isn't a small risk. If your home has been without gas since a meter exchange, you need someone who can diagnose the actual cause, not just try things until the pilot catches.
Ark Plumbing & Heating Can Help
Our technicians are licensed gas fitters through Technical Safety BC, and we serve Maple Ridge, Pitt Meadows, Mission, and the surrounding neighbourhoods, from Silver Valley to Thornhill to Hammond. If your gas meter was recently replaced and something isn't working right, we can check your appliances, confirm everything is connected and sealed properly, and get your heat and hot water back safely.
We offer 24/7 emergency service, so you're not stuck waiting through a cold night if the timing is bad.
A team member will respond within 24 hours for non emergency requests.
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Noah Debebe