I posted my recent Verizon experience on Reddit. What a lively crowd. I love it when people don’t hold back. It was a great experience. One post really got my attention.
“You’re an IT guy with no backup plan for when your internet goes out? It’s like, if you die of thirst you can’t sue the water company.”
I began to think, “Would things have been different if it was the water company?” So I have decided to retell the story from that perspective. Let’s see if the principles change.
Before you bought your house, you had it inspected. Having reviewed the results you went through with the purchase. You called the water company to accept billing for water. The pipes were found to be in good condition, so your expectation was that as long as the bill was paid turning on a faucet would produce water.
Was that a reasonable expectation?
Having never experienced a problem with a water company, should you add to your expenses by ordering the monthly delivery of bottled water?
One day you turn on the faucet, and there is no water. You call the water company, but they can’t confirm that a main has been broken. The water company has you turn on a few other faucets, and look for leaks. There is no water, and there are no signs of damage.
At the conclusion of the water company’s initial trouble shooting they send you a link to their scheduling application. The earliest appointment is 3 days away. You make the appointment. Your thinking, you’ve got some bottled water, and as long as you ration your usage you’ll make do.
The day of the appointment, the water company doesn’t show. It seems like the water company’s scheduling application failed to register the appointment. You call, and they agree to come out the next day. When the water company arrives they quickly find the problem.
The water company was supposed to shut off the water at the house at the end of the block, but they shut off your water instead.
Who is at fault?
Except for the few gallons of bottled water you had when the water stopped flowing, you and your family have not had running water for 4 days. Those few gallons of water were barely enough to keep your family hydrated. Not enough for cooking, cleaning, bathing, washing cloths, flushing the toilet. But now that the water company has corrected the problem that they caused, the water is flowing again. You and your family are relieved!
Then 2 days later, the water stops again.
You call the water company, but they can’t confirm that a main has been broken. The water company has you turn on a few other faucets, and look for leaks. There is no water, and there are no signs of damage.
At the conclusion of the water company’s initial trouble shooting they schedule a visit for 3 days after the second failure. Your thinking, you’ve got some bottled water, and as long as you ration your usage you’ll make do.
The water company was supposed to shut off the water at another house on the block, but once again, the water company shut off your water instead.
Who is at fault?
From the moment the water company mistakenly shut off your water until the moment the water company finally restored your water service, you and your family had access to fresh, running water for 2 days out of 8. For 6 days you and your family were barely able to remain hydrated, cook, clean, bathe, wash cloths or flush the toilet!
For being forced to endure these horrid conditions at the hands of the water company;
How much should you and your family be compensated?
It’s been established that on 2 separate occasions the water company failed to verify the correct address where the water was to be shut off.
The water company failed to verify the address in correlation to the recent shutoff tickets/work orders both times that you reported having no water. Had they done that simple thing they might have caught their mistake and rendered immediate relief, but the water company neglected to do so.
Can the water company be found to be guilty of negligence? Why?
Using the water company to illustrate my experience is a good idea. There are a lot of water company failures to draw from. Consider what happened in Flint, Michigan, or the Alkaline Water Company, or the Las Vegas-Based ‘Real Water’ company. These are just a few liability related cases involving water companies. Time will tell whether the principles put forward in these cases can be applied to our Verizon outage.