Fuck you gas man and fuck the gas company too.

The BBQ Pit
1

We just moved last weekend and I called Friday to get the gas turned on in the new house. I was informed that my landlord had to call the gas company to verify that we are the new tenants before they’ll come out and turn it on. Great! My landlord was gone that weekend and wouldn’t be back until Monday so we haven’t had hot water in the house… can’t wash dishes, can’t shower, can’t clean! We’ve been showering at my in-laws! I called the landlord 4-5 times yesterday and left messages about him calling the gas company and calling an exterminator (the previous tenant left behind her fucking dog’s fleas! That’s an entirely different rant though!). The bastard never called me back! I called the gas company at 4:00 yesterday and was told that the fucking landlord already called them and they were waiting for me to call and tell them when to come turn it on! Of course, by that time it was too fucking late to send anyone so it would have to wait until tomorrow! Fucking cumbucket of a landlord didn’t bother to call me back to let me know I could call the gas company. Thanks asshole.

The gas company only schedules appointments in 4 hour increments! I didn’t want to take anymore time off work because I sat around yesterday waiting for the cable guy. The lady I spoke with yesterday from the gas company said they could have someone come between 3 pm and 7 pm today. Fine, I’ll only have to miss an hour of work. I can handle that. The fucking gas man calls me at 8:15 this morning!! What the fuck! Why bother to tell me that they’re going to come between 3-7 if they’re going to call me at fucking 8:15 in the fucking morning. I called the gas company and raised holy fucking hell. The lady I talked to this time said I was misinformed yesterday. They don’t have a technician that works until 7. The best they could do today is schedule me a 4 hour appointment between the hours of 12 and 4! Make my fucking day. I now have to take a half a day off work and sit on my ass waiting for the fucking gas man! What a crock of shit. Why they can’t schedule an exact time is beyond me. I understand that they have emergencies they have to attend to but c’mon! Surely they have enough technicians that one or two could make exact appointments for something as simple as turning on a residential’s gas! I’m so fucking pissed right now it’s not even funny. I’m getting ready to leave work for the day and I’m pissed about it. I can’t fucking afford to take this kind of time off work. Does anyone know who I can send a complaint to about this shit? Would it even do any good?

Fuck this day to hell! I’m goin’ home.

2

I can relate.
Thursday the cable company cut off our service. Not because we didn’t pay the bill, mind you. They’ve been doing this periodically all over Oakland. They want to make sure you’re receiving cable legally, so they sending out crews to disconnect illegal users. So I get home, what the fuck no cable. I go out and ask a neighbor if their cable is working. Yeah but a cable van was here earlier cutting off some lines.

I go to the phone and call cable. “Is your box on sir?” Yes it’s on, but someone was here earlier cutting off lines, I think they cut mine off by mistake. “Is your TV on channel 3” Yes, it’s always on channel 3, but… “Can you turn it off, and on” Sure, but someone was here earlier turning off cable lines, I think… “Sir we never do that, Can you turn your TV off and On?” I’ll call you back.

I know where the lines come in, I’m going to check. On the way I pass my mail box, and there’s a little post it from cable. “Dear Subscriber: We are conducting audits of cable subcribers in your area. We weill be turning off cable for line that do not match up with cable subscibers. If your line is disconnected in errot please call us…”

I go back to the phone. I get a different technician “Is your cable…” Look I have a note saying that my cable may have been turned off because of an audit. Can you get someone out to turn it back on? “Sir, we don’t do that, we only turn off cable for non-payment” Look, I’m holding the note in my hand. “Can you read it” I do so. “Please hold”

I spend the next twenty minutes on hold. “Sir we’ll be sending a technician out tommorrow, between 8-4” Can you be a little more specific, some one will have to stay home and wait. “No we only schedule during an 8 hour period” Well this is your mistake, I shouldn’t have to miss time off, because of your mistake. “I’m, sorry that’s the best I can do” Can I talk to your supervisor? “Hold”

I spend another 20 minutes on hold, repeat what’s happened to the supervisor. They gave me a weeks credit. Still the cable guy showed up at 5pm the next day. Jackasses.

3

Oh yes. When our neighbors moved, they turned off OUR gas by mistake. So we had no stove, no dryer heat, no hot water. Over the weekend.

It took forever for someone to figure out the problem. By some miracle, they got the gas guy to our house again with some urgency (They tried the “Between 12 and 5 crap” but I hit the roof). I don’t recall ever getting an apology, though.

4

We lost out cable one day, horror of horrors, so I summoned a Helpful Service Representative ™ to fix it. He goes up the pole in the back yard and comes back down with a quizzical look on his face. “This isn’t a duplex, is it?” he asks. “Umm no” I say “It’s a single-family house. Just us.”

“That’s funny, there was a line there for 1044-B.” He shows me a tag marked as such. “Anyways, your cable is back on.”

Soooooo … how did 1044-B (implying that there’s a 1044-A) get cable service when it doesn’t exist? Who the hell put the extra line in? My mother suspects the raccoons were stealing our cable. Furry little bastards.

Call up your gas company and immediately ask to speak to a supervisor. Get as high up the chain of idiocy as you can, then say you want to register a formal complaint. If they jerk you around, tell them your next two calls will be to the Better Business Bureau and your attorney (don’t have an attorney? Doesn’t matter. They don’t know that). Get the name of EVERY person you talk to, first and last. Point out that you were LIED to more than once, and throw around some nice-sounding buzzwords like “fraud” and “breach of contract.” Then, if you can, bill them for your time. (This bit’s hard to pull off :smiley: )

5

ah, “the services”.

these folks drive me to drink! cant tell you about my experiances with them cause i cant type when extreamly pissed off! here is my personal shit list:

dish network (morons, to a man!)
cable (see above)
propane (not ONLY incompetant, but rude!)
power co. (i got them to haul ass after talking to a supervisor, though!)
the phone idiots (“if you experiance a problem, call our emergency service number…” if the FUCKING PHONE DOESN’T WORK, HOW THE FUCK CAN I CALL YOU??)
goddamn sparkletts man (how much f’ing water you think i need? i gotta build an addition just to store it! what, you ain’t never coming back, that why you left 40 gallons?)

the trash guys are okay. i send them money, they take my trash. perfect relationship, so far!

6

So, I was told the gas man would be there sometime between 12 and 4… he called at fuckin’ 12:15!! I took half a day off work for a fucking 10 minute job?!? Bastards! I sent an e-mail to the Kansas Corporation Commission and described, in detail, what was going on and why I was so pissed. I haven’t heard anything back yet. If I don’t hear from them by Friday I’m going to call and will keep calling until I get some results. I’m not quite as pissed today though. Probably because I was able to take a hot shower in my own house this morning!

7

May I add to this?

I had to get our gas boiler serviced recently, and was told that I could request a morning or an afternoon appointment. I chose the former.

Come 12 o’clock, and I’m still waiting for someone to turn up. I call up the firm in question, saying I’d booked a morning appointment. Their answer

“Our morning runs until 1pm”

WTF?

8

Enjoy the hot shower, Rachelle. Hope the new place improves once it is warm and flea-free.

My most recent “service” matter of this sort concerned when we decided to stop cable and installed a rooftop antenna. So the cable company comes out to disconnect. Apparently “disconnecting” would take too much time, so they simply clipped every cable they could find, including the cable to our brand new antenna!

We now shop only at stores that will give more precise delivery timees, even if it costs a little more. I hate that being held hostage for an entire day crap.

9

We tried 3 times to get a second phone line put in. on the third try they told us WE would have to do the rewiring, and then they would come and work some magic.:rolleyes:Fuck you hard with a barbed-wire dildo, cocksocket!!
Roll call: my dad worked at a steel mill, i work at nursing home, and my mom worfks at a grocery store.
Now tell me, where does one acquire the skills to rewire a phone lin in jobs like these?

Got a memo at work at work a few months ago reviewing when we could, and could not page maintenance, This memo also said that we should use a plunger on a clogged toilet.
Janis: “why do we have to do this again?”
Anya: “if i had the mad plumbing skillz i would not be working here!”

10

Evidently they got tired of waiting around til the home was empty so they could sneak in and lounge in recliners to watch cable.

11

What can be worse than when a dish network guy comes to your house and installs your dish backwards, half of the house blocking its way, and so the dish remote controls dont work, as well as the “incompatibility” between your dishnetwork hub thingamajig and your sattelite…

dish network has great programming
dish network is more like trying to install a dishwashing machine into a 10/100 LAN hub.

12

Uh, pay phones? Where I live, a 611 call is free at a pay phone.