If you came home to no hot water and no heat, and there’s a lock on your gas meter, the utility shut you off on purpose. Here is why that happens, what has to be done to get the gas back on, and who does which part. Goody’s Plumbing resolves CPS Energy gas meter lockouts in San Antonio: we find the leak, repair it under a permit, pressure-test the whole system, and call the city inspection that releases the meter. The process is the same every time, and knowing it takes most of the stress out of it.
Why did the utility lock my meter?
A gas utility locks a meter for one of four reasons. Somebody reported a smell of gas and the technician found a leak on your side of the meter. A technician came out for something else and found a condition they can’t leave live, like a corroded riser, an unsupported line or an appliance connection that doesn’t meet code. The service was new, or the meter was just set, and the house hasn’t passed its gas inspection yet. Or the bill wasn’t paid. The first three are plumbing problems. The last one is between you and the utility, and no plumber can help with it.
In San Antonio the utility is CPS Energy. In the Hill Country, on propane, it’s your propane supplier, and the same logic applies to the tank: if a delivery driver finds a leak or fails a leak check, they won’t fill it.
Can I just turn it back on?
No. The lock is on the utility’s side of the meter and it’s theirs. Cutting it is a crime, and they locked it because gas was getting out somewhere. The lock comes off when the utility takes it off, and they take it off when the city tells them the system passed inspection.
What does the plumber actually do?
The plumber does four things, in order.
Find the problem. The utility tag usually says what they found, but it doesn’t always say where. We pressure-test the house piping to confirm it’s holding, and if it isn’t, we isolate the leak section by section until we find it. Sometimes it’s one fitting behind a range. Sometimes it’s a buried yard line that has been leaking for a year.
Fix it, under a permit. Gas work in San Antonio needs a permit, and a lockout is exactly the situation the permit exists for. We pull it under our license. Then we make the repair, whether that’s a fitting, a section of pipe, a new riser or a rerouted line.
Test the whole system. Not just the repair. The inspector wants to see the entire house piping hold a pressure test for the required time, with every appliance valve closed, and we set it up so they can watch the gauge. A gas test in San Antonio is its own permit and its own inspection.
Call the inspection and get the release. When the city inspector passes the test, the city sends the release to the utility. That release is what CPS Energy is waiting for. Without it, the lock stays on.
Who turns the gas back on?
The utility. After the release, CPS Energy sends a technician to remove the lock, turn the meter on, and relight. They’ll want somebody home, because they check each appliance as it comes back. If you have a propane tank, your supplier does the same thing after they’ve seen the test.
How long does it take?
The plumbing part is usually one to two days: find, fix, test. The inspection is scheduled with the city, and the utility reconnect is scheduled with them, so the total is typically three to five days from the call to hot water. If the leak is in a buried line and the yard has to be opened, longer. If it’s winter and the lockouts are stacking up at the utility, longer. What we can control, we move on the same day you call.
What does it cost?
It depends on where the leak is, and we don’t know that until we test. A fitting behind an appliance is a small repair. A yard line isn’t. We test first, then tell you what has to happen and put a number on it before we do the work. The permit and the gas test are part of that number.
What if I smell gas right now?
Leave the building. Don’t switch anything on or off on the way out, including lights. Call your gas utility’s emergency line from outside. In San Antonio that’s CPS Energy. Call us after that, for the repair and the re-inspection, not instead of them.
How do I keep this from happening again?
Most lockouts we see come from one of two places: gas work that was done without a permit and was never tested, or an old line that was never looked at until it failed. If somebody quotes you gas work, ask who is pulling the permit and who is doing the test. And if your house is older and has never had the gas piping tested, a test is cheap compared to a lockout in January.
Talk to us
We resolve meter lockouts. We don’t hand you a phone number. Call 830-837-2810 and a person answers, and if it’s your heat or your hot water, say so. Or send us the details and we’ll come out and test. Everything else we do with gas is on the gas line page.