Piedmont Natural Gas: A Review of Corporate Waste

I used to be a Piedmont Natural Gas customer, thank God I’m not anymore. My wife and I bought a house outside their area and so had to switch natural gas providers. I updated our address with them and canceled our service.

The Surprise Charge(s)

A month later I noticed a strange charge on my bank account. Not just one, the charge was actually charged twice. The info on my statement simply stated: AL INTERSTATE NC DES:PHONE CK ID: FAC*********** (some other numbers which I won’t include here). I did not recognize the name and after a few Google searches I realized it was not online either. I called my bank to help decipher this cryptic mess, but they could not tell me who it was either.

Since I didn’t know what the charge was and neither did my bank, I tried to put a stop payment on the charge, but the bank said it might not work since this charged was done in a way that told them I had given this company access to my account at some point. To stop the payment, I had to print out paperwork and fax it in to the bank.

Total time on hold with the bank, getting transferred, filling out paperwork, faxing, confirming: over 5 hours. [image from Omega Hogwood]

The Credit

The charge was on my account, but two days later, one of the charges mysteriously was reversed. So now I was only out the one charge.

Allied Insterstate (*Satan runs a Collection Company)

Two days later I received a bill from Allied Insterstate [can't find a website, but this Google search reveals that they are not very popular]. Allied Interstate is a credit collection agency. Apparently, they received my account from Piedmont Natural Gas. I had never received a bill from Piedmont Natural Gas, so this was all a surprise to me. I called Allied Interstate to see how I could resolve things as quickly as possible. They informed me there was nothing I could do because they had already received payment from my account (*double charged my account without my authorization). I asked if they had informed Piedmont Natural Gas of the situation. They said there was no way to do so, I had to wait on the system.

I decided that I needed to call my bank and cancel my stop payment. This meant another afternoon on hold and getting to the right people. I canceled the payment and told them who the company was that had charged my account twice.

I then called Piedmont Natural Gas to make sure they had received payment through Allied Interstate. They said they had not but that if I had paid it, it should come thru shortly.

Total time on hold with everyone, getting transferred: another 3 hours.

Piedmont Natural Gas Calls

A few days later, I received a call from Piedmont Natural Gas asking me to pay my bill. I informed them that not only had I never received the bill, that I would be happy to pay but Allied Interstate had already forcibly removed the funds from my checking account. They said they would update they would update their records.

A few days later, the exact same scene played out. Piedmont Natural Gas called and asked if I would pay my account. etc etc.

No More Piedmont Natural Gas

So now I am no longer with Piedmont Natural Gas, and I will do anything before I am a customer again.

Here’s how this scenario could have played out, saving us both time and money, and dramatically changing my perception of them.

1. I don’t get their bill
2. They resend a bill: I pay it
3. Assuming I still don’t pay it for some reason: they call: I pay it over the phone
4. Assuming I don’t get that call and/or never return it: They then hand my account over to a decent collection agency which does not forcibly extract funds from my account twice.

Good riddance Piedmont Natural Gas. Your website is ugly too, and I will cover that next.