FELLOWSVILLE — In the Marquess, Sinclair, Colebank, Stevensburg area of Preston County, 18 Frontier phone customers are asking legislators and the State Public Service Commission for help.
“I haven’t had a land line phone since November 2019,” Norma Murray said.
Murray, 71, and her husband, Jerry, 79, have lived on Goff Hill, Moatsville, for 45 years. Their underground phone lines, they believe, have been there longer, since about 1964.
They’ve been told the lines were damaged by mice, the couple said. One service person told them “you need snakes to get the mice,” Norma said.
Her daughter, Jody Hunter, has kept a log of texts between her parents and Frontier regarding service calls.
“No one has been at my house since November,” Norma said. “Here’s one,” pointing out a text, “ ‘we’ll come tomorrow.’ Well, tomorrow comes and they never come.”
To compound their problems, cell phones don’t work inside their home. “I have to go outside,” Norma said.
Particularly in a Preston County winter, that’s not ideal. Recently she became so chilled after being outside making a call to a county commissioner, trying to get something done about the phone, that she heated her socks in the microwave when she came back inside.
“It is very scary to go outside, and you have to find the perfect location,” she said.
Problems aren’t limited to lack of service. When they returned home from their cabin after deer season, the phone rang nonstop — not because they were getting calls, but because of problems with the phone lines. They unplugged it for a while to get peace.
“And there was a period of time when it rang every two and a half hours. We had to unplug it at night,” Norma recalled.
Her neighbors, including Jerry’s two sisters who are in their 80s, also have trouble with service. And with their husbands out on the farm most of the day, they are left with no communication, Norma noted.
One sister is among three people who are on Lifeline service. With that service, a working phone line is “critical,” said Preston Emergency Management/911 Director Duane Hamilton.
Lifeline is a pendant that calls 911 when the wearer falls or experiences a medical emergency,
Appealing for help
The Murrays and some other customers filed complaints with the State Public Service Commission (PSC). In late January,
they received Frontier’s response to the PSC.
It said on Jan. 22 a tree fell in the Murrays area and that caused damage that took precedence over their outage. The other repairs were slated to be complete by Jan. 28, “However, the repair may not be complete by then.”
The response goes on to say that on Jan. 23, a tech was able to restore service to “approx. four” of the customers in question. A “bad section of cable that really needs to be replaced,” was identified, the company said.
“Unfortunately, we have another more widespread outage going on in Morgantown this week that has forced us to divert resources,” according to the reply,
“Unfortunately, I do not have a estimated
time of completion on this ticket,” the Jan. 29 letter concluded.
The case has now been placed on the PSC’s docket of open cases and forwarded to commission staff for processing. Frontier is required to answer the formal complaint, and a PSC administrative law judge will rule on the complaint on or before Aug. 27.
Eighteen customers signed a petition, which they forwarded to Delegate Buck Jennings, R-Preston, who represents their part of Preston County in the state Legislature.
Norma Murray said Jennings told her he was going to share the information with State Attorney General Patrick Morrisey and suggest a class action suit be filed.
Norma noted news stories about Frontier’s pending bankruptcy.
“What’s going to happen, they serve 29 states, Frontier’s going to leave West Virginia high and dry, and the government’s not going to have any money to bail us out,” she said.
Frontier’s response
The Dominion Post contacted Frontier last week, requesting answers to questions about the customers’ complaints by 10 a.m. Friday.
At 6:39 p.m. Wednesday, Javier Mendoza, vice president for Corporate Communications and External Affairs, emailed back, “I will look into this and be in touch. I appreciate the opportunity to help take care of a customer and we will respond.” No further communications had been received from Frontier by Friday afternoon.
Frontier has given the Murrays a $64 credit on their phone bill. Norma Murray said she was told no more credit can be given until the phone is fixed.
“I said: Well that’s not in the “near future,” she said. “We’re really going back in time.”
TWEET@DominionPostWV
