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Symptom guide / cooktop
A cooktop burner that will not heat or will not light
A cooktop that will not heat or light is the one appliance fault where both Ontario companies behind this page put a free check ahead of every part, and where the source's own table starts at zero: the first two rows of the London page's cost table cost nothing. The job here starts with a path rather than a part: you smell gas - the London page's instruction is not to flip switches and not to light anything, to leave the home, and to call your gas utility or 911 from outside, and the GTA page states that no diagnosis should be attempted at all when a gas odour is present [CA1]. That is why a cooktop burner that will not heat or will not light belongs in the high-risk column before it belongs to any repair, and why the machine has to be unplugged before anything else is touched. Clogged burner ports or a dirty igniter (gas) is the first suspect — not priced [CA1], about 20 minutes — and the cheapest item on the list, coil element burned out (electric), sits at CA$15–CA$60 part [CA1]. Owners describe it as a gas burner clicks but never lights, one element stays cold while the others heat, the whole cooktop is dead and no burner responds or a burner lights and then goes out.
What each fix costs
Cause
Cost
Time
DIY?
clogged burner ports or a dirty igniter (gas)
not priced
20 min
easy
wet burner cap or igniter after cleaning (gas)
not priced
15 min
easy
no power or a locked control: plug, breaker or control lock
not priced
15 min
easy
coil element burned out (electric)
CA$15–CA$60 part
30 min
easy
receptacle or socket block failed (electric)
CA$20–CA$50 part
60 min
advanced
cracked igniter ceramic (gas)
CA$100–CA$180 installed
45 min
advanced
failed spark module (gas)
CA$30–CA$80 part
60 min
advanced
radiant element failed in a glass-top (electric)
CA$130–CA$250 installed
60 min
advanced
gas valve or gas supply problem (gas)
CA$150–CA$280 installed
90 min
advanced
surface control board failed (electric)
CA$300–CA$600 installed
75 min
advanced
A technician visit starts with a diagnostic fee of CA$89 [CA1]. Completed repairs run CA$150–CA$350 [CA1].
What a technician actually does
receptacle or socket block failed (electric) [CA1]
medium likelihoodadvancedCA$20–CA$50 partabout 60 min
one element stays cold while the others heat
The GTA page publishes the receptacle block at CA$20-50 in parts with the all-in replacement at CA$100-160, and states the trade-off the owner has to weigh: the part is cheap, but the job requires removing the drip pan assembly, which is why its own table marks this row as maybe do-it-yourself rather than do-it-yourself. The London page prices the matching row, a surface switch or socket, at CA$150-350 and puts it in the technician-only group. The two published rows are set side by side here rather than averaged. Time basis: neither page publishes a duration, so 60 minutes is a book estimate.
radiant element failed in a glass-top (electric) [CA1]
medium likelihoodadvancedCA$130–CA$250 installedabout 60 min
one element stays cold while the others heat
The GTA page prices a radiant element in a glass-top at CA$130-250 all-in and marks it as a technician job. The London page prices the same row at CA$200-450 and puts it in its technician-only group as well. Both pages treat the glass-top differently from the coil top, which is why this cause is separate here: the element sits under the glass and the surface has to come apart, so the part price alone would understate the job. Time basis: neither page publishes a duration, so 60 minutes is a book estimate.
no part-only price is claimed: both pages price this repair as an all-in job rather than as a part, so the installed price stands alone.
medium likelihoodadvancedCA$100–CA$180 installedabout 45 min
a gas burner clicks but never lights
The GTA page describes the part and the trade: the igniter is the small white ceramic tip beside each burner, electricity jumps from it to the burner to ignite the gas, and replacement involves disconnecting the burner wiring harness, which is why the page puts it with a certified technician. Its stated reason is the one that matters on a gas appliance: mishandling burner wiring on a gas stove is a safety risk. Its all-in row for a gas igniter is CA$100-180 depending on the brand and on whether a standalone igniter or the spark module is replaced. The London page prices a gas igniter or valve together at CA$200-450 and marks that row as TSSA-licensed only, in Ontario. Time basis: neither page publishes a duration, so 45 minutes is a book estimate.
no part-only price is claimed: the GTA page publishes this repair as an all-in figure, and the London page prices the gas igniter together with the valve, so the installed price is the published figure.
medium likelihoodadvancedCA$30–CA$80 partabout 60 min
a gas burner clicks but never lightsa burner lights and then goes out
The GTA page publishes the part at CA$30-80 and the all-in replacement at CA$120-200, describes the module as the component at the back of the stove that sends high-voltage pulses to every burner igniter at once, and puts it with a certified technician because reaching it means disconnecting multiple wire harnesses. On the same page the constant-clicking symptom across all burners, with no knob turned, points at moisture in the module or the burner cap connections, which is why that case is tested before the module is replaced. The London page does not publish a separate spark-module row and prices the gas side as an igniter or valve job at CA$200-450. Time basis: neither page publishes a duration, so 60 minutes is a book estimate.
low likelihoodadvancedCA$150–CA$280 installedabout 90 min
a gas burner clicks but never lights
The GTA page prices a gas valve at the burner at CA$150-280 and puts the gas supply itself in a separate class: locate the gas shutoff valve behind the stove, usually a lever handle, which should sit parallel to the gas line when it is open. The London page prices a gas igniter or valve at CA$200-450, marks the row TSSA-licensed only, and states that the gas section of its page is about safe diagnosis only rather than repair. Both pages put a gas smell outside the diagnosis entirely, and that instruction is in the safety block of this record in the source's own words. Time basis: neither page publishes a duration, so 90 minutes is a book estimate.
no part-only price is claimed: this is a licensed job on both pages, and the London page states that in Ontario gas appliance repairs must be carried out by a TSSA-licensed technician, so the published installed row is the only figure claimed here.
low likelihoodadvancedCA$300–CA$600 installedabout 75 min
the whole cooktop is dead and no burner responds
The London page prices a surface control board at CA$300-600 and puts it in the technician-only group, which makes it the most expensive single row in either company's cooktop table and the one where the decision block of this page starts to matter. It is also the row the London page's own free checks are designed to keep the household away from: the settings check and the control-display reading come first, because a board replacement is a guess if the display was never read. The GTA pages do not publish a control-board row for cooktops. Time basis: neither page publishes a duration, so 75 minutes is a book estimate.
no part-only price is claimed: the row is published as an all-in job by the only page that prices it.
Repair or replace?
The verdict
Two published rules sit above the arithmetic on this page. The first is the London repair-or-replace page's own statement of the industry standard: if the repair costs more than 50 percent of the cost of a comparable new appliance, lean toward replacing it, and it immediately qualifies that by saying the rule is a starting point rather than a law, because a young machine with one failed part is a different case from an old one with the same quote. It adds a second filter it attributes to Consumer Reports: a machine with multiple failures in the past two years tends to continue that pattern, so one expensive repair on a solid unit is not the same decision as a third repair in eighteen months. The second published rule is the GTA service page's age line: repairing usually wins under about 13 years with a single failed part, while a cracked cooktop or multiple failures on an older unit points the other way. Both companies put the free checks ahead of the decision itself, and on a cooktop that is not a formality: the London page states that most stovetop problems trace back to one of five causes a household can check in minutes. [CA1]
Neither Ontario company publishes a job count for this symptom, so no median and no sample size appears on this page for either of them. What the two pages publish are statements about their own work, each with its own scope, and they are repeated here as statements rather than turned into counts: the GTA page calls a clogged burner port the most common reason a gas burner clicks without lighting and calls the wet-cap case one of the most common service calls it receives after a cleaning, and the London page states that most stovetop problems trace back to one of five causes a household can check in minutes. No completed-invoice dataset is quoted on this page either, because no publisher of completed stove invoices cited here breaks its records down by this symptom.
Neither company publishes a replacement price for a cooktop, so this page prints none and computes no break-even line against a new one: what it prints is the two rules above, one against the repair quote and the age of the machine, one against the age and the number of failed parts. The replacement side of that comparison has moved in Canada in 2026 for a reason that appears in neither company's price list: the counter-tariff measure in effect since 8 September 2026 runs 15 to 50 percent on approximately US$28 billion of imports from the United States, with appliances named in the source's own list of affected goods, which raises the price of the replacement rather than the price of the repair. The repair side is priced in Canadian dollars by both companies and is not converted here.
the GTA service page publishes the repair-or-replace line this page uses, in its own words: repairing usually wins under about 13 years with a single failed part, while replacing makes sense for a cracked cooktop or for multiple failures on an older unit. That is a decision line rather than an expected service life, and it is the only age figure either company publishes for a cooktop, so the planning life here is the publisher's own line and nothing is interpolated from it.
Have a quote?
Put your quote and the age of the unit into the calculator — the same half-of-new-price rule, with your own numbers.
clogged burner ports or a dirty igniter (gas) [CA1]
high likelihoodeasynot pricedabout 20 min
a gas burner clicks but never lightsa burner lights and then goes out
The GTA page calls this the most common reason a gas burner clicks but does not light, in its own words: food residue, grease or spills blocking the burner ports, the small holes around the burner head, or coating the igniter tip, so the gas does not meet the spark evenly. It adds that a cocked or misaligned cap is a common cause of poor ignition. The London page gives the same first step with the same limit attached: after the cooktop is fully cool, lift off the burner cap and the grate and clean the burner ports with a stiff brush or a straightened paper clip, because food and grease block the gas holes; anything beyond cleaning the burner and seating the cap is a licensed job in Ontario, not a do-it-yourself one. Time basis: neither page publishes a duration, so 20 minutes is a book estimate.
no part is involved: both pages list this as a cleaning job the owner does, the GTA page prices it at CA$0 in its own table, and the London page states that cleaning the burner and reseating the cap is the limit of safe do-it-yourself work on a gas cooktop.
wet burner cap or igniter after cleaning (gas) [CA1]
medium likelihoodeasynot pricedabout 15 min
a gas burner clicks but never lights
The GTA page publishes this as one of the most common service calls it receives after a customer cleans a stovetop: the burner was working, then stopped after cleaning, because the electrical arc is shunted by moisture instead of jumping to ignite the gas. Its own reading of the constant-clicking case is worth keeping: clicking on all burners even when no knob is turned typically means moisture has reached the spark module or the burner cap connections. Time basis: neither page publishes a duration, so 15 minutes is a book estimate for drying and reseating.
no part is involved: the fix is drying and reseating the parts, which the GTA page lists at CA$0.
no power or a locked control: plug, breaker or control lock [CA2]
medium likelihoodeasynot pricedabout 15 min
the whole cooktop is dead and no burner responds
The London page puts two free checks ahead of every part: a loose plug or a tripped breaker is often free to fix yourself, and a control lock or a wrong setting is free to check in the manual. It states the reason these come first in its own words: before assuming a part has failed, rule out the settings, because this fix costs nothing and embarrasses a surprising number of service calls. It also publishes a free diagnostic the owner can use, the control display, because a dark display narrows the fault down fast. Time basis: neither page publishes a duration, so 15 minutes is a book estimate.
no part is involved: the London page lists the loose plug and the control lock as free checks with no part and no call-out needed.
The GTA page publishes the parts-only row at CA$15-60 for a coil element, calls the swap straightforward, and gives the plug-and-socket test that separates this cause from the next one: move the element to another socket, and if it works there the element was the fault, while a new element that stays cold in the same socket means the socket is faulty. Its parts list puts replacement coil elements at CA$15-40. The London page prices the same replacement at CA$60-180 and marks it as easy, do-it-yourself or technician. Time basis: neither page publishes a duration, so 30 minutes is a book estimate.
Sources
[CA1]Nick's Appliance Repair (Toronto and the GTA, Ontario; gas and electric stoves, 2026) (2026). the per-cause all-in table (cleaning the igniter and burner ports at CA$0, a gas igniter replacement at CA$100-180, a spark module replacement at CA$120-200 with the part at CA$30-80, a gas valve at the burner at CA$150-280, a coil element at CA$15-60 in parts only, a receptacle or socket block at CA$100-160 with the part at CA$20-50, a radiant element in a glass-top at CA$130-250), the replacement coil elements at CA$15-40 in its parts list, the plug-and-socket test that separates a failed element from a failed socket, the statement that a clogged burner port or a dirty igniter is the most common reason a gas burner clicks without lighting, the cocked or misaligned cap as a common cause of poor ignition, the wet burner cap after cleaning as one of the most common service calls it receives, the constant-clicking-on-all-burners case pointing at moisture in the spark module or the burner cap connections, the statement that mishandling burner wiring on a gas stove is a safety risk, the instruction not to attempt diagnosis when a gas odour is present, the gas shutoff check with the lever parallel to the gas line, the CA$89 diagnostic waived when the repair goes ahead, the 90-day parts and labour warranty and the CA$40 discount. The page publishes no job count, so it carries no median on this page.
[CA2]Max Appliance Repair London (London, Ontario; 2026 service pricing) (2026). the cooktop cost table (a loose plug or breaker and a control lock or wrong setting as free checks, a coil element replacement at CA$60-180 marked easy, a surface switch or socket at CA$150-350, a glass radiant element at CA$200-450, a surface control board at CA$300-600, all of the last four in the technician group, and a gas igniter or valve at CA$200-450 marked TSSA-licensed only), the statement that most stovetop problems trace back to one of five causes that can be checked in minutes, the statement that ruling out the settings first is free and embarrasses a surprising number of service calls, the control display as a free diagnostic tool because a dark display narrows the fault down, the instruction that after the cooktop is fully cool the burner cap and grate come off and the ports are cleaned with a stiff brush or a straightened paper clip, the statement that cleaning the burner and seating the cap is the limit of safe do-it-yourself work on a gas cooktop, the statement that in Ontario gas appliance repairs must be carried out by a TSSA-licensed technician and that the gas section is about safe diagnosis only, the gas-smell instruction not to flip switches and not to light anything but to leave the home and call the gas utility or 911 from outside, and the pricing note that the figures reflect typical market rates in London, Ontario as of 2026. The page publishes no job count, so it carries no median on this page.
[CA3]Nick's Appliance Repair (Toronto and the GTA, Ontario; stove and cooktop repair service page, 2026) (2026). the band this page's headline uses, in the source's own words: most stove repairs cost CA$150-350 plus a flat CA$89 diagnostic that is waived when the repair goes ahead, repeated as typically CA$150-350 plus parts with the same CA$89 diagnostic, and supported on the page by a 90-day parts and labour warranty, a same-day promise and a no-fix-no-fee statement; plus the repair-or-replace line this record uses as its planning line, that repairing usually wins under about 13 years with a single failed part while replacing makes sense for a cracked cooktop or for multiple failures on an older unit. The page publishes no job count, so it carries no median on this page.
[CA4]Max Appliance Repair London (London, Ontario; posted 4 May 2026, updated 26 May 2026) (2026-05-26). the 50 percent rule in the source's own words, that if the repair costs more than 50 percent of the cost of a comparable new appliance the household should lean toward replacing it, together with its own qualification that the rule is a useful starting point rather than a law and its examples on both sides; the second filter it attributes to Consumer Reports, that a machine with multiple failures in the past two years tends to continue that pattern and that one expensive repair on an otherwise solid unit is a different decision from a third repair in eighteen months; and its own invitation to factor in energy use on an older machine. It is cited here for the decision rule, not for a price: the page publishes no stove repair or replacement price.
[CA5]Government of Canada, Job Bank (wages for appliance servicers and repairers, NOC 72421; wages updated 19 November 2025) (2025-11-19). the median hourly wage for this trade within its published low and high bands: Canada CA$28.13, Ontario CA$27.00, British Columbia CA$30.49 and Alberta CA$25.00, with the page's own update line stating that the wages were updated on 19 November 2025. It is an hourly wage and not a repair price, and this page does not multiply it by an hour count.
[CA6]ATB Economics (Canadian counter-tariffs in effect, 8 September 2026) (2026-09-08). the counter-tariff measure in effect from 8 September 2026 at a rate of 15 to 50 percent on approximately US$28 billion of imports from the United States, with appliances named in the source's own list of affected goods, and the source's own estimate that the measures add 0.2 to 0.3 percentage points to inflation and shave roughly half a percentage point off Canadian GDP growth.
Last verified: 2026-09-27. Prices are Canadian market figures from the sources above; your quote may differ.
Built from a fact record, not from a template: every number above is tied to one of the sources and the record is re-checked against them. Editorial choices (which symptom leads, which cause is the single tell) are kept in a separate block so the facts stay auditable.
Quick answers
How much does it cost to fix a cooktop with this problem?
Completed repairs run CA$150–CA$350 according to the sources cited on this page, after a diagnostic fee of CA$89.
How long does a cooktop last?
The decision rule used on this page works from a planning life of 13 years.
Repair or replace?
Two published rules sit above the arithmetic on this page. The first is the London repair-or-replace page's own statement of the industry standard: if the repair costs more than 50 percent of the cost of a comparable new appliance, lean toward replacing it, and it immediately qualifies that by saying the rule is a starting point rather than a law, because a young machine with one failed part is a different case from an old one with the same quote. It adds a second filter it attributes to Consumer Reports: a machine with multiple failures in the past two years tends to continue that pattern, so one expensive repair on a solid unit is not the same decision as a third repair in eighteen months. The second published rule is the GTA service page's age line: repairing usually wins under about 13 years with a single failed part, while a cracked cooktop or multiple failures on an older unit points the other way. Both companies put the free checks ahead of the decision itself, and on a cooktop that is not a formality: the London page states that most stovetop problems trace back to one of five causes a household can check in minutes.