After he saw my report on Oncor Electric Delivery’s poor outage information system a week ago, reader Doug Edwards of Dallas summarized my findings better in 18 words than I did in a thousand.

“It looks like you got the brush off from Oncor everybody else is. They always say `Tomorrow, Tomorrow …’ ” was the message he sent via my Twitter feed.

He’s right.

I had asked Oncor why the company couldn’t do better at providing power outage information to the public, especially during a major storm.

But what happened? I got steered into an explanation about how everything will be better in two or three years because we’ll have smart meters.

So last week, I tried again. I pressed Oncor harder when I previewed its new smart meter exhibit, soon to be visiting a county fair near you.

Because North Texas gets its share of severe weather, it’s hard to understand why Oncor won’t do a better job of informing the public when neighborhoods are dark, when crews are working to restore power and when it’s finally restored.

Oncor doesn’t offer that service. That also means that the news media can’t report the latest information to a wider public.

Yet last week I found two electricity transmission companies similar to Oncor that do tell their customers what is happening during bad weather in modern, quick and efficient ways.

AEP Texas, which serves a giant swath of West Texas, presents on its Web site a real-time listing and accompanying color map — broken down by ZIP code — that shows how many customers have lost power.

The information comes from telephone complaints by customers, which are then transferred to the Web site, spokesman Larry Jones said. The site is updated every few minutes. Parent company American Electric Power offers real-time outage alerts in the 11 states it serves.

In Florida, Kissimmee Utility Authority created an outage alert system five years ago that sends text alerts or e-mails to anyone who signs up, giving the number of affected customers by ZIP code. Updates give customers an idea of how quickly the problem is being fixed.

Spokesman Chris Gent says the authority’s system preceded Twitter, which was developed a year later. Now the authority offers both a Twitter feed and its original system to customers.

The service is inexpensive, he said, because it was designed in-house and is run by staff.

The authority is experimenting with GPS devices on work trucks so that information can eventually be used, too.

Several readers called and questioned my plea for a strong Internet alert system for Oncor customers. They said they wouldn’t have electricity to access a Web site.

Remember that hand-held phones and laptops are often battery-powered. Friends and relatives can relay information to you from elsewhere. The news media uses the information. And all of this is important for families that have evacuated and want to learn when they can return.

Does Oncor have any plans to offer an outage alert system?

At the smart-meter exhibit in Lancaster, spokeswoman Jeamy Molina answered, “We’re just not at a place where that can be done right now. It goes back to the grid with the whole outage system. We know when there are widespread outages. We know where that is. It goes back to our restoration process and how it works.

“We understand that there are places that Oncor can improve on its customer service and dealing with these kinds of things. And of course, these will be things that we’ll take into account when we start seeing what we could have done better before the next storm. So that will be something that will come up. But right now, Oncor is not at that place.”

What about the near future?

“It’s stuff that will be talked about, of course,” she continued. “We’ll take this back to our team. We have to review steps about what could be done.”

As my Twitter pal sang in his tweet: “Tomorrow, Tomorrow …”

No system’s perfect

OK, I have a smart-meter story for you. Those are the 21st-century meters that connect directly to the electric company. You can monitor your power usage and set your smart appliances to run at off-peak times. Most Texas electric customers will have one in a few years.

Oncor took a lot of, uh, heat from customers in recent weeks in Killeen and Temple. Soon after their smart meters were installed, their bills jumped. But Oncor says that the increase was due to the cold weather and that it tested about 500 meters and all were accurate.

Even though smart meters are designed to eliminate humans and our errors, there is still that possibility. When an old meter is removed, the final reading is recorded by — gasp — a human.

And wouldn’t you know it? Sometimes people make mistakes. About a dozen so far when it comes to smart-meter conversions, Oncor says.

There’s this one fellow who had a smart meter installed nine months ago at his home in the Austin area (not served by Oncor).

When he received the first bill afterward, he recalls, “It looked like they overcharged me 1,000 kilowatts.”

He called Austin Energy to complain. “The meter reader, in closing out, put the decimal point in the wrong place,” he says. “I was charged an extra 1,000 kwh. So there’s that potential element for human error.”

And who is this fellow who was done wrong?

His name is Terry Hadley.

His job?

He’s the spokesman for the Public Utility Commission of Texas.

If it can happen to him …

Dave Lieber, The Watchdog columnist for The Fort Worth Star-Telegram, is the founder of Watchdog Nation. The new 2010 edition of his book, Dave Lieber’s Watchdog Nation: Bite Back When Businesses and Scammers Do You Wrong, is out. Revised and expanded, the book won two national book awards in 2009 for social change. Twitter @DaveLieber

Update to this: A week after this post, my surge protector, not a Belkin, fried before my eyes — for no apparent reason. I heard the inside sizzle and then smoke drifted out like a pope had been chosen. I pulled it from the adapter and the wall outlet. The little colored cover that lights when the surge protector is on was missing.

This surge protector at Watchdog Nation fried over the weekend, a reminder of the Belkin surge protector recalls.

Do these surge protectors read what is written on blogs about them? How do they know?

It wasn’t easy grabbing that flashlight and magnifying glass and crawling under the desk to read the ultra-tiny serial numbers on the back of my Belkin surge protector to see if I was a candidate for electrocution, but that’s what I did after seeing a little item buried in the back pages of the February issue of PC World magazine.

If you’re reading this Watchdog Bytes on a computer (and the only other way is on mobile device), you probably have a surge protector under your desk. They are supposed to protect your electronics from power surges and lightning strikes. (I have them all over my house and even have a “master” surge protector on the main power line into the house — a relatively new product.)

But Belkin, working with the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, is recalling 68,000 SurgeMaster surge protectors because they have plastic moldings that could crack and lead to electrical shocks. (No cases reported yet, though.)

Models affected are: F9G930-10, F9G930-v10, F9G930-10-W, F9G930G-CL and F9G930-10-SN.

Turns out my Belkin isn’t listed. But if yours is, call Belkin at 1-800-952-1465 or order a free replacement. Customers who own one of these products can telephone Belkin at 1-800-952-1465 or order a free replacement. Visit www.belkin.com/recall.

– Dave Lieber/Fort Worth Star-Telegram Watchdog columnist

On Sunday, Jan. 17, 2010 Verizon Communications takes a step that it may regret.

That’s the day the new FiOS TV and Internet bundling plans are announced.

Friday night, I got a sneak peek, and there’s one stinky little detail in there that couldn’t come at a worse time.

Verizon is raising its early termination fees for new customers to $360.

That comes a couple of months after Verizon Wireless raised its early termination fees for “smart” cell phones to $350.

That action, taken in November, brought negative attention from the Federal Communications Commission, now newly-constituted with Obama appointees.

If Verizon thought that was bad then, just wait…

As first reported in the Dave Lieber column in the Jan. 15, 2010 Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Verizon isn’t alone in charging those fees, but lately, it’s become the poster child for high fees. Across the industry, these fees, called ETF, are among the top four consumer complaints about cell phone service, according to one government report.

One Obama appointee, Commissioner Mignon Clyburn, wasted little time in shifting the FCC’s focus. Two days before Christmas, in only her fourth month in office, she released a statement criticizing Verizon.

FCC Commission Mignon Clyburn

She said the company’s answers to the FCC’s questions about the $350 ETF were “unsatisfying” and “troubling.”

The company keeps changing its reasons for the fee, she stated. Verizon has always said the fees cover the true cost of phones, which are discounted heavily when bought with cellphone service. But in its written response to the FCC, the company acknowledged that the fees may also cover “advertising costs, commissions for sales personnel and store costs.”

“Consumers already pay high monthly fees for voice and data designed to cover the costs of doing business,” Clyburn stated. “So when they are assessed excessive penalties, especially when they are near the end of their contract term, it is hard for me to believe that the public interest is being well served.”

Clyburn is the daughter of the House majority whip, Rep. James Clyburn, D-S.C. She served 10 years on South Carolina’s utility regulatory commission.

I wonder what Clyburn is thinking now that Verizon has confirmed a previously published report about its newest ETF increase for Internet, home phone and television services.

The Philadelphia Inquirer reported earlier this month that it had seen copies of Verizon documents accidentally posted on the company’s Web site. The documents indicated that the early-termination fees for the TV/Internet service could double to $360 as early as Sunday for new two-year-contract holders. The $360 fee would drop on a sliding scale as each month of the contract passed, the newspaper stated. Verizon’s other ETFs also prorate downward through the contract period.

Friday night, two days before Verizon FiOS’ official unveiling, spokesman Lee Gierczynski gave me permission to release details of the newest plan. Here it is, in its entirety:

Hi, Dave:

I’m reaching out to you ahead of time to brief you on the new FiOS packages that Verizon will be launching on Jan. 17.

• We’re introducing new FiOS bundles on Sunday that include new TV packages, unprecedented symmetrical broadband speeds and new promotional incentives.

New triple-play bundle options with a service agreement include:

• Ultimate:  FiOS TV Ultimate HD includes 90 or more HD channels; premium content from EPIX, Showtime, TMC, Flix and the NFL RedZone;  FiOS Internet service with an ultra-fast, symmetrical connection speed of up to 35/35 Mbps; and FiOS voice service – all available for $139.99 a month.
• Extreme:  FiOS TV Extreme HD includes 65 or more HD channels; FiOS Internet service with an ultra-fast, symmetrical connection speed of up to 25/25 Mbps and FiOS voice service – available for $124.99 a month.  In the New York City area this bundle also includes Showtime, TMC and Flix, for a total of 80 or more HD channels, and is available for $119.99 a month.
• Prime:  FiOS TV Prime HD includes 40 or more HD channels; FiOS Internet service with a connection speed of up to 15/5 Mbps and FiOS voice service – available for $109.99 a month.

• These bundles are available with a 24-month service agreement that includes a pro-rated ETF and provides our deepest discounts, promotional incentives and 24 month rate guarantee — or with month-to-month pricing and no contract and no ETF.

• Customers do not have to have a 24-month service agreement or ETF if they want a bundle.  We also offer bundles with month-to-month discount pricing that provide significant savings over a la carte services.

• I can confirm that starting Sunday the ETF on a two-year FiOS bundle will be $360.  The ETF is pro-rated, with $15 subtracted for each full month that the customer honors their contract.  The two-year agreement gives customers the benefit of our deepest discounts, promotional incentives for even more savings, plus a rate that’s guaranteed for the length of the two-year agreement.

• In general, term-plan bundles provide an additional $20 a month savings over discounted month-to-month plans.  Plus, with promotional incentives the savings with a term plan over a month-to-month plan can rise to $40 a month during the first year. (note:  in 7 months you’d break even on your ETF  ($280 in savings versus $270 ETF after pro-ration).

[End of company statement]

This newest termination fee increase is sure to stir the pot. One can imagine consumer advocates who previously have called for ending early-termination fees getting a new energy boost from this.

On the wireless side of the company, Verizon Wireless spokeswoman Audrey Lundy says the company must charge the fees to help pay for the expanded networks that the advanced devices use. For the $350 smartphone ETF, Verizon says it will drop $10 for every month, leaving a $110 fee in the last months of the contract. Customers can also return the device in the first 30 days without any penalty.

Lundy says customers can buy services month to month. The devices are much more expensive, but no ETF is charged.

Last month, U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., introduced the Cell Phone Early Termination Fee, Transparency and Fairness Act, which requires providers to prorate contracts, disclose terms upfront and link ETF to what the provider actually paid for a phone. Verizon and other carriers face two possibilities: Congress could vote to regulate the fees, or the newly reorganized FCC could enact stricter rules.

An aide to Clyburn told me that her battle against excessive ETF is just beginning.

“This is an issue she’s really concerned about, and we’re going to pursue it vigorously,” vowed Clyburn’s spokesman, Rick Kaplan.

#  #  #

What to ask

-How much are the early-termination fees?

-Are the fees prorated if you cancel early?

-What is the advantage of a month-to-month contract?

-What other fees are involved?

-If you have problems, call the Federal Communications Commission’s Consumer Hotline at 1-888-CALL-FCC to share your experiences, opinions and complaints. Information from the calls is collected and studied, an FCC spokesman said.

* * *

Dave Lieber, The Watchdog columnist for The Fort Worth Star-Telegram, is the founder of Watchdog Nation. The new 2010 edition of his book, Dave Lieber’s Watchdog Nation: Bite Back When Businesses and Scammers Do You Wrong, is out. Revised and expanded, the bookwon two national book awards in 2009 for social change. Twitter @DaveLieber

What’s the strangest customer service telephone call you had in 2009?

I have one, and fortunately, I taped it. [Actual audio links are at the bottom.]

The latest sting perpetrated on us by software companies is that employees at their call centers attempt to charge us for technical support because of flaws in their own stupid software. I mean, you shell out $100 for a package, and when it doesn’t work properly, the person at the call center tries to hook you into spending more money to fix it.

However, whether you get charged or not is often up to the customer service rep. Now I’m not going to name the software company involved here because, honestly, I don’t want to get this dude fired. He lives in India. He’s worked for the company for two years. And I like his style. Enough said.

But here’s the rub: He was trying to charge me $80 to install his company’s financial software. I rebelled.  Explained that the salesman said installation was free. Then we struck a gentlemen’s agreement. I would grant him access to my computer if he could look around and examine some of my software programs. Seems that he likes software that Americans have on our computers.

Sounds strange, I know. But remember he is earning the equivalent of about $2,000 U.S. dollars a year helping people like me. He could poke around — with me watching — and have some fun. And maybe I could save $80.

Turns out this guy has a massive infatuation with Microsoft Office. Once, he saw that Microsoft Word installed, he was mesmerized and couldn’t wait to try the buttons and ask me questions.

“We don’t have Microsoft Word here,” he said about his office setup.

“What do you use?” I asked.

“Chris,” he answered, as he continued to push the various tabs to see what Word can do.

“Do you have a computer at home?” I asked.

“I’m planning on getting one.”

Before that, I never realized before that many of the people who help us overseas probably don’t make enough to buy the products that they know (supposedly) so well. They talk to a guy like me who spends more money on electronic equipment than they earn in an entire year. Sometimes, we’re nice to them. Sometimes, we’re not. Whatever.

We spent 10 minutes talking about whatever he wanted to talk about. I was in no hurry. Obviously, he wasn’t being carefully monitored by his supervisor.

“There’s a lot to learn,” he said at one point. “Study never ends.” (Tell me about it.)

Finally, he asked what I did for a living, and I showed him my Web sites.  When he asked what WatchdogNation does, and I explained its purpose, his reaction was abrupt:

“Can you minimize it?” he asked about WatchdogNation.com’s home page.

He quickly turned to my problem. Fun time was over. In minutes, he fixed my installation problem.

And, no, he didn’t charge me.

Listen to Part One of Dave Lieber’s Wackiest Customer Service Call of 2009 here.

Listen to Part Two of Dave Lieber’s Wackiest Customer Service Call of 2009 here.

What was your wackiest call?

Dave Lieber, The Watchdog columnist for The Fort Worth Star-Telegram, is the founder of Watchdog Nation. The new 2010 edition of his book, Dave Lieber’s Watchdog Nation: Bite Back When Businesses and Scammers Do You Wrong, is out. Revised and expanded, the bookwon two national book awards in 2009 for social change. Twitter @DaveLieber