But last night I did clean the rest of the house. I even scrubbed all the grimy little toddler hand prints off the wall. See how good I am at focusing on everything else when I need to accomplish something else?
Total side note: Did you know that if the power company threatens to turn your power off, when you are just 10 days late and have never been late before, it really sucks?
It really really sucks when that said payment has actually been sent through your bill pay, and you have delivery noted on your bill pay website.
So when you hurry to put a stop payment on said payment and then give power company a credit card to make sure your power to your 4 children does not get cut off it can be very stressful.
Especially when you know that if the previous payment and new payment still go through, even though you have put a stop payment, will cause your account to go into the negative. And then the next day when this does happen, you really start to stress.
Your husband then calls the power company guy to ask why the check, he stated they had not received, just cleared our bank in less than 2 hours since we first talked to them and were threatened with cutoff. The stop payment takes 24-48 hours to go through, so since the check was already deposited into the power company's account, it did not reach the check in time to stop it.
Long story short...sort of...after 5 overdraft fees(which are a whole nother story- BofA sucks with inconsistent stories and crazy ways to charge overdraft fees!!) Hubby calls back the power company guy, gets turned down for refund on double payment, gets told that he has no rights, emails corporate power company to file complaint and emails the Public Utility Commission to file complaint. He hears back from the corporate office in 5 minutes and they beg him to let them make it right. They refund us our overpayment plus all overdraft fees and overnight the check to us. Tell us that the bad employee has been reprimanded. And beg us to retract our statement to the PUC, which we gladly do because all we wanted was a refund. So we are happy.
Hubby gets to work and talks to an old regular and tells him the story. (total run on sentence) We find out that, if a consumer (in Texas) who had never been delinquent on a bill and has minor children in their house, has their power turned off with no chance to make payments or deferments, and they complain to the PUC, the PUC will fine the power company $25,000 per day the power is off.
All I have to say, is VERY INTERESTING. No wonder the corporate woman was trying so hard to make it right. (She was very very nice by the way and we will be writing corporate to commend her on a job well done. We believe in giving credit when credit is due.) Paying our paltry OD fees and refunding us our credit that was due is really no big deal compared to $25,000 and an official complaint.
Lesson Learned- Making complaints to the proper authorities actually can accomplish something. And of course if you are going to be late on a utility bill, even if it is just 10 days late, pay them directly online on their website and don't do it through bill pay.
So much for a short story....off to visit my closet.
2 comments:
Ten days really? That's crap. People usually only get paid twice a month so I think at a minimum it should be 20 days before a letter goes out.
Very interesting on the fine and so glad that you got the money back.
(I hate Viewpoint also...they aren't as bad on the fees but they tend to show random amounts online when you check your account.)
They really picked the wrong week to screw with me. They gave me an outlet to focus all my negative energy on. I feel better!
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