After a storm, who fixes what: PSO or an electrician?

Oklahoma storms bring down limbs, and limbs bring down service drops. Knowing where PSO's responsibility ends and yours begins saves a lot of waiting on the wrong phone call.

PSO's side

• The power lines on the poles
• The service drop, the wires from the pole to your house
• The meter itself

Your side

• The weatherhead and the mast or riser pipe on your roof or wall
• The service entrance cable
• The meter base, the box the meter plugs into
• The panel, breakers and every wire in the house

What to do, in order

1. Report the outage or damage to PSO.
2. Look at the outside of the house from a safe distance: is the mast bent, the meter base pulled away, the drop hanging low?
3. If any part of your side is damaged, call us. PSO generally will not reconnect to damaged customer equipment.
4. We repair or replace the mast, meter base or service entrance, coordinate the disconnect and reconnect with PSO, and pull the permit when the city requires one.

Why coordination matters

PSO schedules disconnects and reconnects in set windows, and service crews cover large areas. We coordinate directly with PSO scheduling so the disconnect happens when the crew arrives and the reconnect happens as soon as the work is ready for it. Some meter bases are old enough that replacing the service means replacing the meter base too, and some cities have their own requirements for how a new service is run.

After the power is back

Surges when power is restored are hard on electronics, HVAC controls and appliances. Many homeowners add whole-house surge protection at the panel after the first storm that costs them a TV or a furnace board.

Common storm damage on the house side

• A mast bent or pulled loose when a limb caught the service drop
• A meter base torn away from the wall or with a cracked cover
• Water in the meter base or panel after wind-driven rain
• Lightning damage to devices, doorbells, smoke detectors and HVAC controls

After a lightning strike, some homeowners need documentation for an insurance claim. A safety inspection records what was checked and what was found. One reviewer whose insurer asked for exactly that wrote that the crew came the morning after the call, crawled around, took pictures and checked the wiring and panel to document it.

Older meter bases

Some older homes still have the original meter base, sometimes called a bread box for its shape. When a service is damaged or upgraded, an old meter base usually has to be replaced along with it, because a new service connection is only as good as what it plugs into. We tell you up front whether yours is one of them.