So I closed on my house yesterday and tried to transfer over the utilities under my name today. Water was a piece of cake, all they wanted was my name and new address.
Electric I hit a wall with. The answering machine put me through all the prompts and once it said it was transferring me to a rep I got disconnected. I'm guessing they're still dealing with the power outages all across Ohio, but still, this is no way to treat a customer.
Now Gas... First they ask for my SSN, which I am uncomfortable handing out without a good reason, but I hesitantly give it up. Next they ask me to fax a photocopy of my SSN card and my drivers license. Now this sounded extremely fishy to me. So I asked if I could personally show up at one of their offices and have my identity verified there without them having to keep a copy of my information. Nope, apparently they don't have an office. Then I said, well surely you have some office. Nope... Mailing address? After much deliberation she told me that the company's offices are in Pennsylvania and that I couldn't just walk over, which made me raise an eyebrow. I said, fine, I'll drive over. And she said, no you can't do that and that I only have two options, either fax the info, or not have gas service. I then asked if I could have a copy of their policies mailed to me so that I could verify this strange requirement. She said she would not send me anything. I then asked her if there was a web page that she could point me to outlining the company's policies. No, she wasn't going to do anything for me. I was about to ask her for her manager but she hung up on me.
Not only was she literally demanding my personal info, but she was demanding that I send it to some faceless entity to a fax number that I could not find was linked to the gas company, refused to show me any evidence that my personal information was required as their company's policy, and on top of that she was outright rude.
Also I have a co-worker who recently bought a house as well, same gas and electric company, and he had no such hoops to jump through to get his gas hooked up, and I have never had a utility company ask for so much personal information just to verify identity. Am I mistaken or does this sound off? Personally I think it's a huge liability to have photocopies of my drivers license and SSN card floating around and it's just asking for identity theft.
Electric I hit a wall with. The answering machine put me through all the prompts and once it said it was transferring me to a rep I got disconnected. I'm guessing they're still dealing with the power outages all across Ohio, but still, this is no way to treat a customer.
Now Gas... First they ask for my SSN, which I am uncomfortable handing out without a good reason, but I hesitantly give it up. Next they ask me to fax a photocopy of my SSN card and my drivers license. Now this sounded extremely fishy to me. So I asked if I could personally show up at one of their offices and have my identity verified there without them having to keep a copy of my information. Nope, apparently they don't have an office. Then I said, well surely you have some office. Nope... Mailing address? After much deliberation she told me that the company's offices are in Pennsylvania and that I couldn't just walk over, which made me raise an eyebrow. I said, fine, I'll drive over. And she said, no you can't do that and that I only have two options, either fax the info, or not have gas service. I then asked if I could have a copy of their policies mailed to me so that I could verify this strange requirement. She said she would not send me anything. I then asked her if there was a web page that she could point me to outlining the company's policies. No, she wasn't going to do anything for me. I was about to ask her for her manager but she hung up on me.
Not only was she literally demanding my personal info, but she was demanding that I send it to some faceless entity to a fax number that I could not find was linked to the gas company, refused to show me any evidence that my personal information was required as their company's policy, and on top of that she was outright rude.
Also I have a co-worker who recently bought a house as well, same gas and electric company, and he had no such hoops to jump through to get his gas hooked up, and I have never had a utility company ask for so much personal information just to verify identity. Am I mistaken or does this sound off? Personally I think it's a huge liability to have photocopies of my drivers license and SSN card floating around and it's just asking for identity theft.
