This is another rant about dealing with bureaucracy. My previous ones have all been about dealing with the health care “system”. In those cases it was basically about trying to get disparate bureaucracies communicating properly so that I could get a refill on a vital medication.
This one is about electricity and getting meters installed so that I can actually pay for it.
Several months ago, I don’t even recall when exactly, probably April or May; we had a fire in a breaker panel of the duplex I’m currently living in. This was due to water leaking in during a very bad storm. Fortunately it never went further than the panel but the fire marshal said that both panels had to be replaced and had PECO (our local utility company) cut off the power until this was done. In the process of doing this they removed the meters, which is apparently standard procedure.
My landlord hired an electrician to do the work. They replaced the two panels and also had to install all new wiring up into my apartment. All of this took about a week and then power was restored and my downstairs neighbor and I were able to move back in. At this point all that had to be done was for code inspections to pass on the work so that PECO could reinstall the meters.
Code inspection failed the work with a list of minor issues that I won’t go into. The electrician did the work and inspections was notified.
We went through several cycles of the inspector failing the work and the electrician correcting more things. There was a terrible fire in town a number of months ago where a family, including children, had died, so the town is now very cautious, which I completely understand and am grateful for.
So a couple of weeks ago the electrician called and told me that I needed to call code inspections because the inspector needed to get into my apartment. This was late on a Friday afternoon so I called inspections and had to leave a voice message.
The following Monday the inspections office called me and told me that it was not necessary for the inspector to get into my apartment because the work had passed the last inspection. I had been told previously that once inspections had passed on the work, the fire marshal would contact PECO, the meters would be installed, and regular service would be restored. So I assumed at that point that PECO would be contacting me about scheduling a time to have the meters reinstalled, since it would entail cutting off power for a short time.
I haven’t heard anything from anybody since then, so today I called PECO to try to schedule a time. They informed me that they needed to hear from the fire marshal, and that they also needed some sort of meter installation request from the electrician. I called the electrician and his receptionist had no idea what I was talking about and said that their work was done months ago. They are going to call PECO and try to figure out what’s going on.
Meanwhile I haven’t had to pay for electricity for months, so I feel kind of conflicted about complaining, but it’s still a headache dealing with all of these different organizations, all pointing their fingers at someone else.
You’d think that PECO, if no one else, would have a strong incentive to communicate with the necessary parties to get this wrapped up so that they can stop providing free service, but instead it all falls on me.
Edited to add: Dangit, I screwed up the headline. It should be How to get free electricity…