Virginia Natural Gas

We have a house in Williamsburg, Virginia that we moved out of in September of 2010. No one has been living in the house. The only use of the gas was for keeping the house from freezing. The heat was kept way lower than when occupied. Water usage was only when we did cleaning and upgrades as the home was going on the market compared to daily showers, clothes washing, dish washing, etc.

In December of 2010 our Gas Bill was $101.35. In 2009, when we lived there, it was $110.23. As this makes no sense, we contacted Virginia Natural Gas. My wife called, as the account was in her name from a previous marriage. She was given the old run around with no answers. When the woman she was talking to refused to offer any plausible explanation, my wife asked to talk to a supervisor. Request Denied!

Infuriated, my wife told her to turn off our service (We had received a cut-off notice due to our not figuring we would have such a bill). A week or so later, I had an opportunity to try to resolve the situation. I have never in my life met such a self-righteous human being, a person with such a God complex. This woman, flat out refused to let me talk to anyone but her!

Here is another little tidbit, she did not cut our service off when we first asked. She made sure we got another month's charges on our account! Surely there is someone we can talk to that can help us with this account. If I lived in Georgia, I would go to their offices myself and sit there until someone, anyone but this extremely arrogant woman!

I have been without water for 2 weeks now! I have missed 2 new service appointments, due to the fact that I have to work. I specifically left notes in the account for the technician to come between the hours 4-6pm. What do they do? They come before 4pm, in which I'm not home yet! I freaking told these people that I would not be home before 4:00pm. I have been without hot for 2 weeks now. I'm past frustrated. I will be calling whomever I need to call because this is ridiculous. There are people who actually work for a living, and can't be home. The window they gave is from 8am-6pm. So, the person I just spoke with said that the window was from 10am-4pm. **!

I called Virginia Natural Gas to have service turned on and found out that I had an enormous (to me) past due balance in which they wanted me to pay up front and also an additional deposit. I told them there was no way I could come up with all that money at once and asked them if I could make payments. They said no, so I said the only thing I could do was to file bankruptcy.

They turned on my gas and 2 months later, I received a shut off notice for the unpaid high old balance. I called them and spoke with a supervisor and told her that I really did not want to file bankruptcy that I wanted to do the right thing and pay off my bill, so the representative put me on a payment plan paying $100.00 a week (every Friday). After 3 weeks or so, my payday changed and I told them that I would have to pay every other week from now on. I was told okay.

So, that Monday I came home from work to find my gas shut off which leaves us no hot water, no heat, no drying our clothes, nothing. Tuesday, I called Virginia Natural Gas and talked to Ms. Sheila in the Escalation Team Department who was very nice. She put me on hold a couple times and came back saying that I could be put back on the payment plan and my payments would be every other week beginning May 7, 2010.

I was very happy about that but she also said that I just needed to go pay $200.00 and call back with the receipt number and my gas would be turned back on. So I scrounged up $200.00 that I didn't have and went to Farm Fresh and paid it, came home, called in with the receipt and was told that Ms. Sheila didn't have the authority to do what she did and that I either had to pay off the entire balance plus a new bill or file bankruptcy.

I was very upset and called back the next day to speak again with Ms. Sheila who was very apologetic and felt bad but said her supervisor told her that because of the amount of my balance I was not allowed to be put back on payments, yet they put me on payments before for close to the same amount. I have three children and I was paying them every week like promised but now there telling me that they would rather have me file bankruptcy than make payments and believe me paying an extra $100.00 a week is a lot of money to me. I would like to know if they can just cut people's gas (especially families with children)when I was making the payments.

Well, I have 3 beautiful children who have to go elsewhere to take showers because an ice cold shower or bath is hard to do especially for my 6 year old little girl. We have no heat, luckily it's not that cold our dryer doesn't work, so I'm spending money that I dont have at laundromats and with three children laundry piles up.

I moved into a rental home that unfortunately used gas for heat. I called up Virginia Natural Gas to get it turned on. After 20 minutes of listening to my rights, she told me I owe them a $700 deposit just to turn it on because of my credit. My mouth dropped, and I voiced how ridiculous $700 is when the electric company only asks for $180. She told me that I would be able to call up after 6 months of perfect payments to get my deposit credited to my account.

I am on a tight budget and an extra $235 a month for the first 3 months was outrageous, when I don't even use more then $120 a month during the winter. So I called them on February 1 to get my deposit credited back to my account, and I get told I have to wait until August because it's 12 months of perfect payments instead of 6.

I asked why the woman lied to me and that I agreed to 6 months not 12 when I signed up, and they told me I misunderstood her and that it was my fault and never that the woman misspoke. Then I was told that the reason why it was $700 was because it was based on the usage of the previous owners. The previous owner was an elderly lady, and she kept it at 85 degrees. At most, I will be spending $500 over a 12-month period. They said they only based it off the winter months, so $300 is what I will be spending during the winter months.

She told me they sent me out a letter about all of this on May 13. We didn't move in or have it turned on until May 31. So of course, we did not get the letter. I busted my butt to pay every month on time, if not early, just so I could get my money back in those 6 months. And now, they deny me, not because I was late, but because the woman lied to me during sign up just to get me off the phone.

I am overly strapped for cash now, because I should have been able to spend more during the winter in heat, because I would be getting my $700 credited back. I guess it's Ramen and tuna fish for the next 6 months. I feel like my money is being held hostage because of the bad economy.

I am on the budget plan w/Virginia Natural Gas and have been disconnected twice in the last 3 months. I am not even 1 month behind & my bill is $71.00 on the budget plan. I had made arrangements using their automated system to pay the bill on 11/4/09. I had made those arrangements on 10/22/09 & when I got home our gas was disconnected.

I paid the bill on Saturday, 10/24/09, and called them to have it reconnected on 10/26/09, Monday morning. They will not re-connect our gas until Monday, 11/2/09, and I have to take off work from 8 to 12 to make sure someone is home to relight the pilot lights. I have a balance of $71.00 due to Va Natural Gas by 11/22/09! The inconvenience of this whole situation is unbelieveable: cold showers, cold water to wash hands in the flu season & disinfecting hand soap is good but without hot water it doesn't work as well, all clothes have to be washed in cold water & hot water is what really kills germs on towels, washcloths, sheets, pillowcases, & dishcloths & dish towels. So all germs, especially flu can be spread much more easily.

VA Natural Gas is very quick to turn your gas off, but to get it turned back on takes 10 days? What rotten customer service! They also have a $400.00 deposit on my account based on a prior owner's usage as my budget payment is only $71.00 per month. Does this make any sense? This type of customer service is ridiculous and the worst of any in this area.

I have never had so much trouble with any ""public service"" company. You can rarely understand the person you have to speak to as they are from India/Bangledesh, etc, & have very thick accents. If you ask for a supervisor, they also have a thick accent. If there was any other natural gas provider in the area, I would change so quickly & so would a lot of other people I know!

At approximately Nov 7th I placed a telephone call to the gas company about a gas leak reported behind the master meter at 1274 Rosemont Ct. The gas company has refused to give Management here at First Oakmont North Townhomes any information concerning the problem in writing.

There is a potiential danger because there is a strong odor of gas escaping into the atomosphere of an apartment complex.

This charge was not approved by th regulatory agencies, nor the customers and is not charged in any other States.