Local PUD/Electric Association New connection Issues

bjr · May 14, 2021

A coworker sold his house in town and bought five acres to build a new house on, a little way out in the country. He's been workin' with the engineering dept of that PUD, following all the guidelines; paid the drop costs for their wire and transformer (that was like $10,000). The trench was dug conduit pipe laid, inspected and backfilled. That was over two months ago. Now they tell him they (I think possibly the country building/survey people maybe involved here) have to do some kind of property boundary search and survey. When he filled out the permits he had given them all the legal descriptions and a plot plan for their approval. So far he's not received anything in writing explaining any issues. I'm thinkin' that the PUD should just go ahead and get the wire ran and the transformer installed as they already designed and approved the trench route. This should be the PUD's issues not the property owner. I'm hoping there's some grey hair wisdom in this forum that's been down this road and give some insight and offer some suggestions. Thankyou bjr

RickB · May 15, 2021

Guy bought 5 acres of land he should have a survey in hand.

Roadworthy · May 15, 2021

I live in eastern Washington and as I understand your friend's progress the conduit is now in the ground. At this point the state electrical inspector is not involved as the power company (PUD) does their own thing. They should have had an easement in place before placing the conduit. With the conduit in place they should be able to set the transformer - assuming there is an easement there. This should be entirely between the PUD and the property owner. The electrical inspector doesn't come into play until a trench is opened for the service drop.

Steppenwolfe · May 15, 2021

Roadworthy said:
I live in eastern Washington and as I understand your friend's progress the conduit is now in the ground. At this point the state electrical inspector is not involved as the power company (PUD) does their own thing. They should have had an easement in place before placing the conduit. With the conduit in place they should be able to set the transformer - assuming there is an easement there. This should be entirely between the PUD and the property owner. The electrical inspector doesn't come into play until a trench is opened for the service drop.

Yes... we had to sign an easement for our new buried line with the Power Co.

bjr · May 17, 2021

Roadworthy said:
I live in eastern Washington and as I understand your friend's progress the conduit is now in the ground. At this point the state electrical inspector is not involved as the power company (PUD) does their own thing. They should have had an easement in place before placing the conduit. With the conduit in place they should be able to set the transformer - assuming there is an easement there. This should be entirely between the PUD and the property owner. The electrical inspector doesn't come into play until a trench is opened for the service drop.

Exactly, this what I thought. When the coworker tries to drill down for detail the PUD's representative just shrugs his shoulders and tells my friend "your in the line". At this point "it's none of my business" and I just have to "let it go". Thank you for you guys input. bjr

oosik · May 18, 2021

When I applied for electrical service I had to prove I had legal access to my property. I have a mile long - 30 foot wide - access to my property. It's called my driveway. They came off the main line and ran poles right down the north side of my driveway. I paid - they installed - no problems.

grsthegreat · May 18, 2021

With all the building going on in the PNW, he’ll just have to stand in line. I’m being told of 2 months for new service.

cqaigy2 · May 18, 2021

My favorite in dealing with putting in power was when talking to the PSE "engineer" about what else needed to be done to get power to our place. And kind of weird thing is, he responded to my wife, that there 'was a waiting line and she just had to get in line'. 'They don't just drop everything and put in power for homeowners.' My wife said, "You were contacted 8 months ago, and we supplied all the documentation requested". He kinda snorted, when my wife said 8 months ago. I asked him where the file was, his desk was a mess, im sure he couldn't find anything. While he was shoving piles around looking for it, i noticed our drawing and pulled the file out of his mess and handed it to him. Sure enough, dated last September in my wife's hand writing. The same lazy one that said, until you get a drive into the place, he wasn't going to walk the 600' to where the two building sites were. Then after we put the drive in, he said we would have to uncover down to the mains our selves. Nobody i'd talked to said they had to uncover the main power, and had never heard of it. But the guy doing the excavation said, don't piss'em off or they'll make your life miserable. So here goes shovel a 4' by 4' hole, down 6' to the mains. Fortunately, we have NO rock, till bed rock, so the shoveling wasn't too bad. Then the guyS that do the install show up. "WHO UNCOVERED THE MAINS?!!","THAT'S HIGH VOLTAGE, WTH!!?. I pulled out my notebook and told him the name of the PSE "engineer", my excavator backed me up and said he was here when such and such said it. And i thought the lead guy was pissed when he saw the power uncovered, he got even madder, and verbally expressed displeasure about the "engineer" and apparent recreations participated in.

grsthegreat · May 18, 2021

dont get me started about the utility engineers. i have gone round and round with those aholes for many years. the field guys are the salt of the earth, the engineers need to be hit in the head with a backhoe bucket a few times to straighten them out.

even their lineman shake their heads once the suits leave the site. then they do it the way we want.

i really cant believe someone asked you to uncover the mains. amazing.

it was avista engineers that changed temp power pole requirements from 4x4 treated to 6x6 treated for underground use. they said "a 6x6 will last longer".

its a TEMP power pole ment to be used for a few months. their morons

oosik · May 18, 2021

WoW!!! I sure missed a whole lot of excitement when our power was installed. Met with lineman & engineer - out at the county road. The lineman walked the driveway with his rolling distance meter. The engineer and I rode back to the house in my ATV.

The lineman told us the cost - it was written in on the one page agreement. All three of us signed the page. I wrote them a check. Work began three days later. Took them eight day to install twelve poles, string the line, connect to my outside breaker box.