Power play a painful saga

By CATHERINE KING*

The request was straightforward enough: Please would Genesis organise the appropriate contractors to disconnect and remove an unwanted power line.

The company was most helpful: The job would be done after two working days' notice.

That was on March 13. The next day a nice man arrived to remove the meter but couldn't because the lines were still up.

A small case of wires crossed - and an ominous sign.

He said not to worry, he would come back when he was passing and whip it out. He did a final reading while he was there. After 10 days, I rang Genesis again. It was apologetic and would get right on to it - after two working days' notice.

Five days later saw a repeat performance. By my fourth call I was getting annoyed, but suddenly we got results.

A puzzled lady from Northpower rang to say it had twice been instructed to do the job but was not allowed to work in our area.

She said our ICP number clearly stated UN, which meant UnitedNetworks.

I was aware of that but foolishly expected Genesis would be, too. After all, it had all the details on its computers.

I rang Genesis a fifth time.

The lady said she'd see the supervisor. If I'd just wait she would organise it directly. I waited.

Then: Two working days! One moment, I asked - why are the instructions going to Northpower? They aren't, she replied decisively.

That afternoon a lady from Northpower rang. "We have just received a message to remove lines at your address. We can't work ... "

We tossed for who would ring Genesis and I let her have the privilege.

By now, one month from my first attempt, you'd wonder why I didn't phone UnitedNetworks myself but by this stage all our friends were enjoying the farce.

At this point the meter man returned to do his part of the job. He left again.

My sixth attempt was on April 15. The woman at Genesis insisted that Northpower did that work.

When I queried that, she put me on hold ... then came back to tell me she had spoken personally to Bob from Northpower, who said its workers would be there the next day.

April 22, seventh attempt.

Instead of going through my off-by-heart spiel, I just identified myself and asked the lady if her screen told her anything about me.

Oh! Someone was meant to be there at 10am that very day. She would chase the matter up immediately.

Finally, the explanation: UnitedNetworks removes lines, not Northpower. Northpower does disconnections.

UnitedNetworks was awaiting her instructions and the job would definitely (her words) be done in the next two days.

By this time I was starting to feel as though it was an unreasonable request.

Words like customer service and user-pays float around.

Are we going to receive a whopping bill for all this trouble they've been put to? Are the lines ever coming down? The fact that trucks work under these lines and we wanted them down for safety reasons is apparently irrelevant.

Does the fact that our location is near a border confuse things - although why should it? Inside an area is inside an area. The computer knows where we are.

Just think of the savings with one less connection. It could be said that I was doing the company a favour.

And yes, in spite of the final reading on March 14, we have received a bill for next month.

The lines are hanging on.

* King is a Herald reader from Wellsford