PatchLead sends HVAC contractors in Canada live transferred calls rather than form leads: we run the advertising, answer the homeowner, confirm the problem and the postal code on that call, then transfer them to your phone while they are still on the line. Calls cost $60 to $150 each in Canadian dollars and become billable only after 60–90 seconds of conversation, so short calls and wrong numbers are free. Each call is exclusive to one contractor.
The difference between this and a shared HVAC lead is the thing you are buying. A shared lead is a form, delivered to several companies, that you then have to chase. This is a homeowner who has already described their problem to someone and is waiting on the line for you to pick up.
That changes the arithmetic in your favour in one specific way: you are not paying for the attempt, you are paying for the conversation. Everything below is the detail — what a call costs, what makes it free, what you can turn off, and what we do not do.
What an HVAC call from PatchLead actually is
A homeowner searches for furnace or air conditioning help and calls the number on our advertising. An AI-assisted assistant answers, states that the call is recorded, and confirms what has actually gone wrong, whether it is a repair or a replacement, and the postal code. Only then is the call transferred to a contractor.
You answer a phone that is already connected to someone who needs an HVAC technician. There is no callback window, no queue, and no form to work through — the qualification has happened before your phone rings, and the time spent on it is never billed to you.
- No-heat and no-cool calls, furnace and AC repair, replacement and installation enquiries.
- The job and the postal code are confirmed on the call before you are connected.
- You see the caller's details as your phone rings, so you can decide before you answer.
- The homeowner pays nothing to use the service. You are not selling them PatchLead.
The HVAC jobs these calls are actually for
HVAC leads are routed in two groups, and they are genuinely different work: repair and installation. You can take one, the other, or both. The split matters because a no-heat call at seven in the morning and a planned system replacement are different jobs, sold differently, and worth different amounts to an HVAC business.
What the assistant confirms before transferring is which of those it is, what has gone wrong, how urgent it is, and the postal code. That is the qualification you are paying for — and it is why the HVAC leads you receive are described rather than merely captured.
HVAC repair calls: what has broken, and how soon
Repair calls are the reactive half. The homeowner has something that has stopped working and they want somebody today: a furnace that will not fire, an air conditioner blowing warm, a heat pump stuck in one mode, a thermostat that has lost its schedule, a blocked condensate line, or noise and smell from an HVAC system ignored for a season too long.
Emergency AC repair in July and no-heat calls in January are the two spikes, and both arrive with the urgency already in the caller's voice. These convert fastest, because the decision has effectively been made before you answer — what remains is whether you can get there.
HVAC installation and replacement enquiries
Installation calls are the considered half. The homeowner has decided, or is deciding, to replace equipment: an ageing furnace, an air conditioner past economic repair, a first heat pump, a full HVAC installation in a home being renovated, or duct work that no longer suits the house.
These callers ask about sizing, efficiency and rebates rather than how fast you can arrive, and they take longer to close. They are also worth considerably more per job, which is why judging them on the same conversion window as a no-heat call will make a good channel look like a bad one.
- Furnace — no heat, short cycling, ignition failure, replacement enquiries.
- Air conditioning — no cool, emergency AC repair, poor airflow, replacement.
- Heat pumps — changeover faults, efficiency questions, first-time installation.
- Ductwork and airflow — duct cleaning enquiries, balancing, extensions for renovations.
- Thermostats and controls — failures, upgrades and smart-controller questions.
What HVAC leads cost
HVAC leads from PatchLead cost $60 to $150 per connected call, in Canadian dollars. Where a particular enquiry sits in that band depends on the job behind it — a furnace replacement is priced differently from a thermostat question, because it is worth a different amount to you.
A call becomes billable only once you and the homeowner have been talking for 60–90 seconds. Below that it is free, automatically, with nothing for you to claim. A caller who hangs up as you pick up, a wrong number, or a transfer that drops all cost nothing.
There is no setup fee, no monthly subscription, no minimum spend and no contract term. You fund a prepaid balance and each billable call is deducted from it; your card is not charged every time the phone rings.
| What you pay | When it applies |
|---|---|
| $60–$150 | Per connected call, by job type |
| Nothing | Calls under 60–90 seconds, wrong numbers, dropped transfers |
| Nothing | The same homeowner reaching you again within 30 days |
| Nothing | Setup, monthly subscription, minimum spend |
Rates are set per job type and confirmed with you before your first call. Last updated 2026-09-07.
What HVAC leads cost per booked job, which is the number that matters
Sticker price per lead is the wrong comparison, and it is the one most HVAC companies are invited to make. The number that decides whether a channel pays is cost per booked job: what you spent to put one paying job on the calendar, not what you spent per enquiry.
The arithmetic is short. Take what you pay for a lead, divide by the share of those leads you actually book, and you have it. Thirty dollars a lead sounds cheap until one in twelve books — that is $360 a booked job. A $90 connected call that books one time in four is $360 as well. Identical cost, with the difference showing up somewhere the invoice does not: the second one cost you four conversations instead of twelve chases.
That is the honest case for buying HVAC leads as calls rather than as forms. It is not that the unit price is lower — it is not, and any vendor claiming otherwise is comparing different things. It is that the conversion rate is attached to a person already on the phone, and that your technicians' time is the input you cannot buy more of.
Run the sum on your own numbers before you believe ours. If you have been buying shared HVAC leads, you already know your booking rate on them; if you have been running your own ad spend, you know your cost per call. Those two figures are the only ones needed to compare, and they beat any table a lead generation company puts in front of you.
What makes HVAC leads high or low quality
Lead quality is the word every vendor uses and almost nobody defines. Used precisely, it means how much of the work of finding out whether this is a real job has already been done before it reaches you — and who absorbed the cost of the ones that were not.
The limit of that claim, stated plainly: qualification covers the job, the urgency and the location. It does not cover whether the homeowner will like your quote, whether they own the property, or whether they will proceed at all. No lead generation company can promise that, and one that does is selling you a number it cannot produce.
What low quality HVAC leads have in common
Low quality HVAC leads share three features: the homeowner did not know they were generating a lead, the same enquiry went to several HVAC contractors, and nothing about the job was established beyond a postal code and a phone number. You pay for the attempt, and the attempt is where most of them end.
What makes an HVAC lead high quality instead
High quality leads, by contrast, are ones where a person stated the problem out loud and stayed on the line. That is the whole design here: homeowners actively searching for HVAC help call our advertising, describe the fault, and are transferred while still on the phone. Qualified HVAC leads in that sense are not a grade we award — they are a consequence of the call never having been broken into a form in the first place.
Buying HVAC leads vs generating your own
Most HVAC businesses end up doing both, and the two are worth separating rather than ranking. Generating your own means ad spend, a landing page, call tracking, someone answering the phone, and the months it takes before the numbers stabilise. What you get for that is an asset: your own cost per call, your own data, and no dependency on anybody's platform.
Buying HVAC leads means none of that setup and none of that ownership. The advertising risk sits with the vendor, you pay per outcome rather than per click, and you can stop tomorrow. What you give up is the compounding — you are renting demand rather than building it.
The comparison that actually settles it is not buying versus generating in the abstract. It is your current cost per booked job against the cost per booked job of the alternative, measured over enough calls to mean something. Anyone who tells you the answer without asking for your booking rate has not done the sum.
When buying HVAC leads is the right call
The case for buying is strongest in exactly two situations: you have technician capacity sitting idle this week, or you are testing whether a service area is worth committing advertising to. Both are problems of timing, and both are ones a channel you can switch on and off in an afternoon solves better than a campaign does.
When your own ad spend is the better investment
The case for buying is weakest when you already have a channel producing jobs below your target cost per booked job. At that point the right move is to spend more there rather than diversify away from it — buying HVAC leads alongside it will look like growth while quietly raising your blended cost per job.
Exclusive: the call is not shared with other HVAC companies
Every call is exclusive. It rings one HVAC contractor at a time, and the same conversation is never sold to two companies at once. You are not one of four shops racing to call back the same form, and only the contractor who answers is charged.
The honest qualifier: if you do not pick up, the call moves on to another contractor rather than sitting in a queue, because the homeowner is waiting. What it never becomes is a shared lead — at no point is one homeowner's enquiry sold to several HVAC companies to compete over.
How the call is qualified before you get it
Lead verification on a form means someone checked a phone number resolves. Verification on a live call means the homeowner has already said out loud what is wrong and where they are, and is still on the line to be asked again.
What we confirm on the call is the trade, the nature of the job, the urgency and the postal code. What we deliberately do not do is promise anything about the contractor: PatchLead holds no licence information and carries out no credential checks, so we do not claim to have verified yours or anyone else's. Contractors agree in writing to hold the licences Ontario requires.
What you control
Spend is capped by you. Every setting below is changed from your account and applies to the next call.
- A daily cap on transfers. Hit it and you pause automatically until tomorrow.
- Which HVAC job types you take — accept furnace replacement work and skip duct cleaning enquiries.
- The postal codes you cover, and how far you will travel from each.
- Pause and resume from the portal or your phone, before you go up a ladder.
- Calls are placed Monday to Saturday, 9am to 7pm, and not on Sundays, and you can narrow that further with your own hours.
Where we send HVAC calls today
- Cities
- Almonte, Burlington, Calgary, Concord, Edmonton, Gloucester, Huron, Listowel, Ottawa, Pickering, St. Paul, Stormont, Dundas and Glengarry United Counties
- Provinces
- Alberta, Ontario
- Postal areas
- K0A, K0C, K1G, K1J, L1V, L4K, L7L, N0G, N4W, T0A, T2C, T2M, T2W, T2Y, T3N, T5A, T5L, T6E
If you work outside those areas you can still apply — we will hold your details and contact you when we open there, rather than sending you calls we cannot supply.
We would rather tell you we are not in your area yet than take money for a service area we do not cover. Applying from outside it puts you first in line rather than on a list that goes nowhere.
Common questions
How much does an HVAC lead cost in Canada?
With PatchLead, $60 to $150 per connected call in Canadian dollars, depending on the job type — a replacement enquiry is priced above a repair because it is worth more to you. The call only becomes billable after 60–90 seconds of conversation, so anything shorter costs nothing, and there is no setup fee, subscription or minimum spend.
What does a live transfer HVAC lead cost compared to a shared lead?
A live transfer costs more per unit than a shared form lead and should: the homeowner is already on the phone asking for HVAC help, and only one contractor is charged for the call. The number worth comparing is cost per booked job, not sticker price. Divide the call price by the share of calls you convert, then run the same sum on your shared leads.
Is the call exclusive, or do other HVAC companies get it too?
It is exclusive. The call rings one contractor at a time and the same conversation is never sold to two companies at once, so you are not competing with three other shops over one homeowner. Only the contractor who answers is charged. If you do not pick up, it moves on to another contractor rather than going to voicemail.
Do you screen for furnace, heat pump or air conditioning before transferring?
Yes. The assistant confirms what has actually gone wrong before the transfer — whether it is heating or cooling, a repair or a replacement, and the postal code. You can also switch individual job types on and off within HVAC from your account, so you receive replacement enquiries and not maintenance questions if that is what you want.
Can I take HVAC installation leads without taking repair calls?
Yes — repair and installation are routed separately, and you can take either on its own. Contractors chasing replacement work often switch repair off entirely, and shops filling technician hours do the reverse. Bear in mind the two behave differently: installation enquiries take longer to close and are worth more per job, so judge them on cost per booked job rather than on how quickly they convert.
What is a good cost per booked job for HVAC leads?
There is no universal figure — it depends on your average job value and your margin, so a number that works for a replacement-led business is wrong for a service-led one. The useful method is the same either way: divide what you pay per lead by the share you actually book, then compare that against your other channels. Any vendor quoting you a target without asking your booking rate is guessing.
Can I take only no-heat emergency calls and skip maintenance enquiries?
Yes. Job types are set per contractor within your trade, and changes apply to the next call. Turn on the work you want and leave the rest off. You can also cap how many transfers you take per day, so a busy morning does not commit you to a full day of calls you cannot service.
Do you transfer HVAC calls overnight and on weekends?
No. Calls are placed Monday to Saturday, 9am to 7pm, and not on Sundays, evaluated in the homeowner's local time. Outside those hours nothing is dialled, so you will not be woken at 2am by a transfer. Within that window you can narrow things further with your own calling hours, and you are simply not in the running while you are closed or paused.
What if I miss the transfer because I am under a furnace?
Nothing is charged — a call you do not answer never becomes billable, and it moves on to another contractor so the homeowner is still served. If you know you will be unreachable, pause from the portal or your phone and calls stop ringing through until you resume. The platform also skips you while you are already on a call.
What if a billed HVAC call was a bad fit?
Dispute it from that call's row in the buyer portal within 48 hours of the call and we review the recording. Where the dispute is upheld the amount is credited back to your account balance to spend on future calls. A homeowner who decides against the work on price is a normal commercial outcome rather than grounds for a credit.