what can I do about this?

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I just moved into a new apartment, and the electricity is still not on. I told them I needed it set up on Friday, got an account and gave the number to the landlady etc. Still no power, and it's Saturday afternoon.

I tried calling the number she gave me for emergency maintenance situations like this about 5 times over the past few hours and it keeps going straight to voicemail. I left one for her explaining the problem hours ago. The electric company customer service isn't answering either because it's Saturday.

I am extremely frustrated. I'm paying rent already, I've paid for yesterday to the end of the month. I followed all the instructions they gave, and the assistant manager told me yesterday he would ask about the power for me, but apparently didn't. I should have electricity by now.

It's dark and cold in here. Not to mention the fact that I can't cook any food for myself without power. All of the stuff I have requires heating (rice, microwave items).

You won't get anything until Monday at least. The power company puts in an order to connect the power after you call and set up your account. They tell you what date they will come to turn it on. It's not always the date that you begin paying rent on. They are closed on weekends usually, although here the customer service office is always open and the emergency service dept is always open. They won't come out on a routine call to turn power on or off over the weekend. If I were you I'd go back to my grandparents until Monday.

Did you call to set up the account in your name? Unless the power is included in the rent it's not the landlords responsibility. You call the power company, give them your name, birth date, social security number, where you work or go to school. They run a credit check and tell you the amount you would need to give them for a deposit or whether or not you need a co-signer. Once the deposit is paid or you have a co-signer that signed then they tell you what day they are coming to turn on your power.

They won't do anything except during business hours. Even if they set it up for a particular date, if something happened and they couldn't get to it you would still have to wait until the next business day. Calling them won't do anything. If your power is included in your rent, you could check Monday and see if a connection order has been put in, then ask when you could expect it to be cut on. Go back to your grandparents or to a friends for the rest of the weekend. You will only be in the dark if you stay there. Thats just how the power company does things.

ETA; just reread your post. I missed a part of it. Sorry, I'm really sick today with this bronchitis - I'm just getting worse on antibiotics, not better.

OK, maintenance has nothing to do with it. The power company turns it on at the meter, maintenance would only be concerned with inside wiring. Maintenance can't turn it on for you. The power company obviously hasn't been out yet. Call them Monday morning. There is no way that it could be on but maintenance has it turned off, so I'd leave them alone this weekend. Like I said, go somewhere else and call the power company Monday morning. Nothing will happen until then.

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I don't know where you are but where I have lived in the past our power companies had 'emergency fault line' or similar to ring if you were experiencing power issues. The fault seems to be with the power company. I would try these things:

1. Do you have a 'mains switch'? This may also be called a 'circuit breaker' where you are? If so, can you access it? If it's an apartment building, where are the circuit breakers? There should be one with your apartment number on it, and it should be in the on position. If there isn't one 'for the whole apartment complex' then you should have an individual one with a meter.

2. Call the power company's emergency line. I'm sure they have one.

I think it's illegal to leave someone sitting in the dark for a period of time, especially over winter if you need heat, or over summer if you need cooling. If the apartment complex isn't responsible, the power company needs to send someone out asap.

Ugh. How frustrating. I'm sorry. What I would do is go ahead and 'report an outage'. You do have an outage, because you were told the electricity would be in, but it is out. That's definitely an 'outage'. I'd give that a go and see what happens, otherwise you will probably be without electricity until Monday or later, which is unacceptable.

I use one of these (pic) during power outages.
I rotate three 20-lb Propane tanks.
This solves multiple problems at one time. It heats the house, allows you to cook food, and does not
use any electricity.
I've used it for hours at a time in winter during power-outage and it burns so clean that
it always registers zero on my digital Carbon Monoxide detector.
Never had a problem. I added a pressure gauge to the fitting that goes to the tank so I
can monitor how much Propane is left in the tank.

http://www.demmelhuber.net/media/images ... 300___.jpg

That'd be nice if I had more than 20 dollars in my wallet right now.

But guess freaking what? They turned the meter on the day I called them (Thursday) which means it actually IS the maintenance people's problem according to the guy I talked to. The electric company isn't even allowed to touch the main breaker, which is what he said the issue is. And it's not like I have access to the main breaker either.

I am SO angry right now.

That is beyond frustrating. So the electric company is saying it is an apartment maintenance issue and they are doing nothing and you have just moved in, right? What does it say in your lease about maintenance issues? Sounds like they could be breaking the law, but geez talk about getting off on the wrong foot when you've just moved into a place.

Yes, basically he says the policy is they can't touch customer equipment, which is the category that the main breaker falls under. But he said he can confirm they sent someone to turn on the meter on Thursday, so the only possible fix is to contact maintenance. You know, the ones who have the phone turned off.

Check if your building has a basement or equipment room.
See if you can find the switch boxes.

You may see one of these for each apartment:


or the switches might be inside one of these boxes:


and it might be outside on a wall.

Is your hot water heater gas or electric?
If gas then you may be able to heat your place some by using the shower to fill the tub with hot water.

Can you have a walk around and look for the main breaker? There should be one with your apt number on it. It's also possible that it's locked and can only be accessed by the maintenance people. Are you leaving messages about the electricity on the emergency line if that's an option?