Update(s), some ranting – you know, the usual crap
So...talked with my daughter last night…she seems to be holding out for her re-scheduled dated of January 2…so now the plan is to drive up there on New Year’s day and spend most of the week watching my grandchildren…I plan on being really tired when I get back...I will need to mainline some coffee while I am up there.
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So...right before x-mas I got my new ‘budget’ amount from Dominion East Ohio Gas company (who will herein be referred to as ‘the bastards’)...my budget amount went from $200 to $356!!!!!!!!! Now mind you we don’t have the heat on at our house (well barely) the thermostat is set at 63° in other words, we are freezing. The bastards have made it so that we have plastic up and blankets over every window and I bought some space heaters because I’d rather pay a higher electric bill...
Needless to say when I got the bill I nearly fainted. I can not pay this amount. Period – not even close - I can maybe swing maybe $300 if I cut some other necessity out of my life...
Not to mention that fact that the bastards haven’t even come to our house to do a meter reading – they are basing this on last year’s usage – and last year our heat was set to 68/70...
So I decide to call the bastards to reason with them. Big mistake. The female representative of the bastards finally answered my call – I was on hold for like 22 minutes (I am sure it’s other people screaming at the bastards too)…so ‘she’ answers and I introduce myself and ask after her holiday – she must have sensed what my call was about and she was having none of the niceties. So I tell her straight out : ‘We can’t afford the new budget amount’. She said ‘We are not making adjustments m’am, the price of gas has gone up 50% and it’s about to go up more.” I say ‘I realise that but we can’t afford this – we can probably afford about $300/month but not almost $400/month’. She says: ‘Would you rather pay $450/month?’ in a rather snotty tone. (WTF???) ‘Uhm no, I say I can’t afford either amount. And besides this bill is ‘estimated’ by you guys, we don’t even have the heat on in our house, we have plastic and blankets over all the windows and we have space heaters – so your estimate has to be incorrect – and again we can’t afford $356/month.’ Again she asks: ‘Would you rather pay $450/month?’ so OK by now I am totally incredulous at the stupidity of this person and the futility of this conversation. I say ‘Look you aren’t getting EITHER amount from me, OK! I can’t afford it! I don’t know what part of this you aren’t hearing’ she cuts me off ‘You aren’t understanding what I am saying, your gas bill last year was $300/month, gas prices have gone up. (Note: I just read yesterday where gas prices have dropped by 10%!!!!!!) ‘If you don’t pay the budget amount you are going to have to pay more, would you rather pay $450????’
I then asked to speak to a supervisor. She retorts: ‘My supervisor isn’t going to adjust your budget amount either’. So then I say ‘How do you sleep at night, lady? Cause you know people are having to decide between eating and paying their gas bill’. She snorts: 'I don’t make the rules here.’ To which I reply ‘And it’s obvious you don’t get it either, you aren’t very sympathetic to your customers’ problems’. She say: ‘What makes you think I don’t understand?’ I say ‘Cause if you did you’d be just as outraged as the rest of us and perhaps you’d get in touch with your congressman but then you people probably have them in your pocket…’ She says: ‘Well you can go to another provider but it won’t change your budget amount’ (I am thinking she is now threatening me). I once again say: ‘I can’t afford the budget amount and I am not paying it – period and I don’t know what part of that you just aren’t getting’ finally she says ‘You can not fall 3 budget payments behind or they will cut off your gas and they will not allow you to be on budget again’ So then it dawns on me that what she is in essence saying is that all along I CAN pay only $300 as long as I don’t fall 3 payments behind (amount-wise) in my gas bill – however I also realise that I could get to that amount quickly if we don’t do something about this…and I am at a total loss as to what to do. I say to her ‘So basically you are saying I CAN pay you only $300?????’ ‘Well I can’t tell you that’ she says ‘but yes as long as you don’t fall behind 3 budget payment amounts in the balance on your bill…’ I cut her off ‘Why didn’t you BEGIN the conversation with that when I told you that I could not afford my budget amount, instead of over and over asking me if I’d rather pay $450/month – making it sound like a threat – you know what lady, you get what you get’. Furious, I hung up the phone.
WHAT THE FUCK??????
I don’t get it – on my way home last night I noticed that the corner gas station where yesterday the price of a gallon of gas was $2.05 was now $2.29 – I mean what the hell is going on? And all we do is sit by and do nothing – we all just take it?????? I talk to other people and their budget amounts aren’t all that much – I don’t know whether to talk to my landlord and explain and let him know I can’t afford to live there anymore. I mean I don’t have the heat on in a couple of rooms, but we have an older house, the windows aren’t very good, there’s probably no insulation, and we have steam heat so I can’t just completely shut off the gas to any of the rooms...my son and I are freezing half the time – we spend inordinate amounts of time in our respective rooms, under blankets, or we walk around with sweaters on and blankets wrapped around us...it’s no way to live. I am going to have to figure out how to make cuts in my spending somehow and with a growing young man on my hands I just don’t know how. I am not going to ask him to pay bills but I might now not be able to help him as much with his college costs and it’s killing me.
Isn’t there something we can do about this??? Isn’t there someone who can help us with this??? Perhaps my ranting or worrying is a little too little too late but what’s a person to do? This is crazy and I don’t see it getting any better – I don’t want to move but I might be forced to...
********************
So...right before x-mas I got my new ‘budget’ amount from Dominion East Ohio Gas company (who will herein be referred to as ‘the bastards’)...my budget amount went from $200 to $356!!!!!!!!! Now mind you we don’t have the heat on at our house (well barely) the thermostat is set at 63° in other words, we are freezing. The bastards have made it so that we have plastic up and blankets over every window and I bought some space heaters because I’d rather pay a higher electric bill...
Needless to say when I got the bill I nearly fainted. I can not pay this amount. Period – not even close - I can maybe swing maybe $300 if I cut some other necessity out of my life...
Not to mention that fact that the bastards haven’t even come to our house to do a meter reading – they are basing this on last year’s usage – and last year our heat was set to 68/70...
So I decide to call the bastards to reason with them. Big mistake. The female representative of the bastards finally answered my call – I was on hold for like 22 minutes (I am sure it’s other people screaming at the bastards too)…so ‘she’ answers and I introduce myself and ask after her holiday – she must have sensed what my call was about and she was having none of the niceties. So I tell her straight out : ‘We can’t afford the new budget amount’. She said ‘We are not making adjustments m’am, the price of gas has gone up 50% and it’s about to go up more.” I say ‘I realise that but we can’t afford this – we can probably afford about $300/month but not almost $400/month’. She says: ‘Would you rather pay $450/month?’ in a rather snotty tone. (WTF???) ‘Uhm no, I say I can’t afford either amount. And besides this bill is ‘estimated’ by you guys, we don’t even have the heat on in our house, we have plastic and blankets over all the windows and we have space heaters – so your estimate has to be incorrect – and again we can’t afford $356/month.’ Again she asks: ‘Would you rather pay $450/month?’ so OK by now I am totally incredulous at the stupidity of this person and the futility of this conversation. I say ‘Look you aren’t getting EITHER amount from me, OK! I can’t afford it! I don’t know what part of this you aren’t hearing’ she cuts me off ‘You aren’t understanding what I am saying, your gas bill last year was $300/month, gas prices have gone up. (Note: I just read yesterday where gas prices have dropped by 10%!!!!!!) ‘If you don’t pay the budget amount you are going to have to pay more, would you rather pay $450????’
I then asked to speak to a supervisor. She retorts: ‘My supervisor isn’t going to adjust your budget amount either’. So then I say ‘How do you sleep at night, lady? Cause you know people are having to decide between eating and paying their gas bill’. She snorts: 'I don’t make the rules here.’ To which I reply ‘And it’s obvious you don’t get it either, you aren’t very sympathetic to your customers’ problems’. She say: ‘What makes you think I don’t understand?’ I say ‘Cause if you did you’d be just as outraged as the rest of us and perhaps you’d get in touch with your congressman but then you people probably have them in your pocket…’ She says: ‘Well you can go to another provider but it won’t change your budget amount’ (I am thinking she is now threatening me). I once again say: ‘I can’t afford the budget amount and I am not paying it – period and I don’t know what part of that you just aren’t getting’ finally she says ‘You can not fall 3 budget payments behind or they will cut off your gas and they will not allow you to be on budget again’ So then it dawns on me that what she is in essence saying is that all along I CAN pay only $300 as long as I don’t fall 3 payments behind (amount-wise) in my gas bill – however I also realise that I could get to that amount quickly if we don’t do something about this…and I am at a total loss as to what to do. I say to her ‘So basically you are saying I CAN pay you only $300?????’ ‘Well I can’t tell you that’ she says ‘but yes as long as you don’t fall behind 3 budget payment amounts in the balance on your bill…’ I cut her off ‘Why didn’t you BEGIN the conversation with that when I told you that I could not afford my budget amount, instead of over and over asking me if I’d rather pay $450/month – making it sound like a threat – you know what lady, you get what you get’. Furious, I hung up the phone.
WHAT THE FUCK??????
I don’t get it – on my way home last night I noticed that the corner gas station where yesterday the price of a gallon of gas was $2.05 was now $2.29 – I mean what the hell is going on? And all we do is sit by and do nothing – we all just take it?????? I talk to other people and their budget amounts aren’t all that much – I don’t know whether to talk to my landlord and explain and let him know I can’t afford to live there anymore. I mean I don’t have the heat on in a couple of rooms, but we have an older house, the windows aren’t very good, there’s probably no insulation, and we have steam heat so I can’t just completely shut off the gas to any of the rooms...my son and I are freezing half the time – we spend inordinate amounts of time in our respective rooms, under blankets, or we walk around with sweaters on and blankets wrapped around us...it’s no way to live. I am going to have to figure out how to make cuts in my spending somehow and with a growing young man on my hands I just don’t know how. I am not going to ask him to pay bills but I might now not be able to help him as much with his college costs and it’s killing me.
Isn’t there something we can do about this??? Isn’t there someone who can help us with this??? Perhaps my ranting or worrying is a little too little too late but what’s a person to do? This is crazy and I don’t see it getting any better – I don’t want to move but I might be forced to...
1 Comments:
gas prices
i have read that .. it will continue to rise up because demand in developing countries (china, india) are rising up. one way to escape this is if the state starts to seriously take on alternative sources of power which is highly unlikely.
i have seen bio fuels being used in cars .. not sure if it also applies to the houses ..
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