kdm0811
Bronze Member
I think that anyone with a back hoe, FEL, (or shovel), should know about the experience that I had with my telephone company last year when I installed a board fence around my 4 acre horse pasture. I started by calling Miss Utility to request the marking of utility lines that my fence might cross. I had marked the proposed fence line to assist the utility locator service. The locator service determined that a telephone line crossed under the proposed fence in 2 spots. They marked the buried telephone line with orange spray paint. I was told not to excavate within 24" of the lines. I was also told that my "ticket" would expire in 15 days.
The fence is a (very horse friendly) conventional 3 board design with wood post fence on 6 foot centers.
Soooo, I started boring 330 post holes for the fence. In doing so, I found EVERY rock, stone, and boulder that I own! By the time that I arrived at the second fence crossing site, I had been drilling for 3 weeks, and broken about 20 shear bolts on the auger. I targeted one of the two fence post holes at 30" from the center of the orange spray paint that was still clearly visible in the ground.
I did not know that I had cut the cable to my neighborhood until I saw the telephone truck roll up. Looking down the hole, there it was. The severed cable. However, I was in the center of my hole (30" from the orange mark)!
I was told that I was at fault because I was excavating with an expired work ticket. My assertion that the hole was located according to the erroneous utility locator's mark was dismissed as "irrelevant". I was told that I should have had the ticket renewed (even thought the orange paint was perfectly clear). I was also told that if I had drilled the same hole a week earlier (damaging the cable) it would not have been my fault.
A week later I received a letter from the phone company requesting the contact information for my homeowner's insurance agent. I responded with a letter explaining my position (everything above), and that they would be better off to determine why the marks (of a cable 14" deep) were 30" off.
2 weeks later, I got a more threatening letter indicating that I owed them $873 in damages. I responded with another letter, and included a copy of the first.
Then the phone calls started. I maintained that the time of the damage was completely independent of the cause of the damage. The calls were very threatening and implied that they had a room full of lawyers ready to take me to task if I were to request a 3rd party review of the situation. None the less, I was not at fault, and I was not going to pay.
It took me 6 months to reach a person of authority, accountability, and intelligence within the phone company. But I finally did, and my case was change to "DO NOT BILL".
In summary, if your project goes past the "ticket date", call the SOBS out to mark it again. And if there is damage that is their fault, FIGHT IT. The system is strategically set up to cause you to fail and give up. But I am proof that you can win!
One other thing, take lots of pictures of the marks, utilities, and excavation with yardsticks showing the pertinent locations of each.
The fence is a (very horse friendly) conventional 3 board design with wood post fence on 6 foot centers.
Soooo, I started boring 330 post holes for the fence. In doing so, I found EVERY rock, stone, and boulder that I own! By the time that I arrived at the second fence crossing site, I had been drilling for 3 weeks, and broken about 20 shear bolts on the auger. I targeted one of the two fence post holes at 30" from the center of the orange spray paint that was still clearly visible in the ground.
I did not know that I had cut the cable to my neighborhood until I saw the telephone truck roll up. Looking down the hole, there it was. The severed cable. However, I was in the center of my hole (30" from the orange mark)!
I was told that I was at fault because I was excavating with an expired work ticket. My assertion that the hole was located according to the erroneous utility locator's mark was dismissed as "irrelevant". I was told that I should have had the ticket renewed (even thought the orange paint was perfectly clear). I was also told that if I had drilled the same hole a week earlier (damaging the cable) it would not have been my fault.
A week later I received a letter from the phone company requesting the contact information for my homeowner's insurance agent. I responded with a letter explaining my position (everything above), and that they would be better off to determine why the marks (of a cable 14" deep) were 30" off.
2 weeks later, I got a more threatening letter indicating that I owed them $873 in damages. I responded with another letter, and included a copy of the first.
Then the phone calls started. I maintained that the time of the damage was completely independent of the cause of the damage. The calls were very threatening and implied that they had a room full of lawyers ready to take me to task if I were to request a 3rd party review of the situation. None the less, I was not at fault, and I was not going to pay.
It took me 6 months to reach a person of authority, accountability, and intelligence within the phone company. But I finally did, and my case was change to "DO NOT BILL".
In summary, if your project goes past the "ticket date", call the SOBS out to mark it again. And if there is damage that is their fault, FIGHT IT. The system is strategically set up to cause you to fail and give up. But I am proof that you can win!
One other thing, take lots of pictures of the marks, utilities, and excavation with yardsticks showing the pertinent locations of each.
