I had cable installed 9 months ago. The installer ran an aerial line from the pole in the alley to the deck of my house, crossing my driveway diagonally. The height of the drop at its lowest point (dead center of my driveway) was 8 feet above the concrete. I have a camper on my pickup. The line has been ripped down 9 times and 9 different technicians from the cable company has come out to repair it. The last time it was fixed properly because the electrical inspector was at the house next door and saw what was going on. The inspector advised the last repair technician that any wire/fiber cable that crossed over a driveway must be a minimum of 14 feet above the driveway per NEC. After I showed the inspector the receipts for all the previous repairs and the initial install she cited the cable company with 19 violations - one (1) installation without a permit, nine (9) repairs without a permit and nine (9) installation violations. $12,035.00 total fines for the cable company!
All that probably could have been avoided by the initial installer doing a midspan instead of coming straight off the pole. I dont know if it would have been a lot higher but at least it wouldnt have crossed the driveway. 8 foot off the ground in most municipalities is a code violation in and of itself but you see it all the time. does your main electrical connection also cross your driveway?
LOL. Perfect!! I love it!!! My neighbors electrical drop ran diagonally across my from yard and my driveway where I parked my travel trailer and accessed my gate to my back yard. My neighbor was a sweet 93 year old lady, great neighbor that we watched over like our own family. We purchased a 42 foot 5th wheel camper that has a 13'6 height clearance. The neighbor's city power drop was 10'6". Well, I contacted the city utility company (small city, everyone pretty much knows everybody) and advised there was an issue with the drop. The utility manager came out and we reviewed the issue. BTW, I had already researched the "easement" the easement on my property is for my service, not anyone else's. I didn't want to be difficult, so I offered a location on my property for a utility pole to be placed to allow the drop to be clear of my camper. The camper would be under the drop when parked, and would limit my ability to work on the roof of the camper, but I wanted to make it easy. The utility manager told me the pole would cost me $1500. I said "no it won't, it will cost the utility Dept." He didn't comment. He then said, "well, you can hire an electrician to raise your neighbors weatherhead." I told him that won't be necessary. He looked at me funny and I told him that the weathered already was longer/ freestanding than code permits, that the city utilities' easement can not prohibit free use of my property so the issue is the cities and they have two weeks to resolve it as that is when I take delivery of the 5th wheel and I will have free access of my property. The manager looked at me, looked down, and he said "you did your homework, didn't you?". The next day when I came home from work, I had full access to my property. My 93 year old neighbor sat in her chair in the carport the whole time giggling. Don't let utility companies take advantage of you for their pure laziness and lack of doing things correctly.
For that AT&T installer to knowingly place a low-voltage cable in a 220v electrical cabinet should be fired. He KNEW it went through that cabinet because it's stuffed through the front of the box.
There's no voltage at all in the ATT cable. It's fiber. But still the installation looks like shit, as usual. Notice the bulging in the drywall on the inside next to the fiber port.
As a cable installer they drilled from inside without checking what was on the other side. My line of work is not known for having the best and brightest.
Yup, so many people drill from the inside without even walking outside to guage what's on the other side. I've seen this before. Hell, I even did it myself. I was screwing a medicine cabinet up in a tenants bathroom, and they installed the damn breaker panel on the other side of the wall, Zip! Right through a breaker. Loud ass pop, blew the breaker, I'm glad I didn't have my hand on the bit like I normally do, I believe the drill insulated me from the power. I went right through 220v dual pole breaker. 😂 I can laugh about it now, but it scared the hell out of me.
My sister had cable installed in brand new home, for over 9 months she always wondered why she had a sewer gas odor. I taller drilled dead center thru 3” sewer stack and ran wire thru it. Over $10,000 in damage. Cable company tried to deny they were at fault.
@@s.c.o.s4672that does seem excessive, but between the actual repair, the drywall work, texture matching, repainting the wall from corner to corner, etc. I can easily see $3k
Had my well pump replaced a few years back. I use a 110v submersible pump. He switched it to a 220v pump, and wanted to tap into my AC unit for power. And warned me to not run both at the same time. That was a fun day. He had no choice but to drive 60 miles round trip to get the right pump and reinstall it. Also came back the next day because every single fitting leaked. This is a guy that's been in business for over 40 years.
Similar screw ups happen in my area too...We built a custom home with heavy shake roof for a customer and installed flashed hard pipe through the roof to allow for mounting satellite tv dish on the roof and routing of cable through the pipe into the attic. Cable guys came , installed the dish directly to the roof with lag bolts through the heavy shakes and ran the cable down the roof to the gutter and under the roof eve then through the wall...they didn't touch the galvanized pipe we installed for mounting the dish and cable, we didn't see them install the antenna but we did shower them with a few choice words prior to their leaving the job.
We also had a dish installer think he was going to install the dish on our new roof. I said absolutely not. He then said he would install it on the siding. I said you're not drilling thru my siding. He ended up putting 4x4 into the ground and attached to that.
Looks like the existing wiring would violate any fire or safety code, preventing the box cover from closing and not being secured. Kudos for giving the customer a price break!
A lot of people don’t have the slightest bit of knowledge for basic things like that. I’m 23 and the last thing I’m going to do is call for someone’s service. I’m doing every bit of internet learning before I have someone come out lol. But the breaker is always the first thing you should check when something big like that isn’t working.
I had to run an antenna line into a bedroom once, and the guy said "Please do a better job than the Directv guy did". He showed me where a hole was drilled through the baseboard opposite a closet. There is an open pocket door there with a matching 3/8" hole drilled through it also...
I can't imagine how dumb that installer was, but wow. I'm not an HVAC guy, but I am a landlord - some of the weirdest damage I encounter in the houses is caused by satellite and cable installers. It just doesn't make sense sometimes, but it almost always looks terrible.
My Mom has two rent houses (my grandpa's old house and the one he built beside it) and they have flat roofs. Direct TV/Dish Network "installer" threw his dish up on the roof and ran lags directly into the NEW flat roof . *facepalm*
I saw this happen and the guy drilled through the 220 wire that fed the disconnect so we had to cut the drywall open inside and repair. The cable and phone guys are creative little buggers
you should change the disconnect, run a new wire, make them move the fiber cable and they should reimburse the customer or pay you directly. they knew damned well what they did, as I guaranteed it killed the drill bit. I myself have hit live wiring in the past and it practically removes the whole drill bit end, especially appliances and other hard wired things, with high current breakers and no AFCI/GFCI protection.
For sure the feed cable has been compromised and needs to be replaced. No telling how much the drill bit reduced the current carrying capacity of the cable. A hot spot could lead to a fire as the air conditioning season progresses. ATT had no business going through that disconnect.
It's the smart move, but he's probably busy up to the gills in calls. I love having the time to do a job right, but sometimes you get so busy you do the job, 'up to code'. Maybe you come back once the immediate safety issue is addressed.
Might want to address those bare wires in the disconnect that got tore-up by AT&T's drill bit (yeah, could see bare copper and tore insulation in your video @ 5:55). Pretty obvious, though, that dude didn't drill from the outside of the house... he found a nice place to put his modem inside and didn't bother to check for obstacles on the other side of the wall. He realized his mistake once he went outside to feed the cable but knew the homeowner would be a little angry if he had to punch a second hole the wall (leaving his first hole exposed) so he just didn't say anything. Since the drill bit grounded one of the hot legs to the disconnect box outside the house while he was drilling from inside, he couldn't have seen the spark so he figured it was still good.
I really do have to say, this guy is very polite and professional with his job. You can tell he really loves his job from how seriously he takes it too.
I Literally just figured out after watching this video, why my ac conditioner wasn’t working, it hadn’t occurred to me to check the breaker box for a problem originally, not until I had heard it mentioned in this video and I was stunned because it was a trip in the breaker box and I have you to thank for giving me the clue and saving me some cash.👍
Xfinity destroyed all the electrical in my house, which included almost everything plugged in including the air conditioner. Just to rewire the house cost $24,700. Total so far has been over $62,000 of damage. Both Xfinity and their insurance company don't care. Their insurance company spent about 5 hours in total inspecting the damage over several visits, but did not even open up one plug sockets that I saw. If they did, they would have seen several of the grounds had melted. Sloppy. They did not even bring in an electrical engineer to check the system out. As I said, they really don't care.
@@court2379 Yeah, that story doesn't add up at all. That's not how wiring works. I cannot *possibly* think of a situation that internet wires could cause that would require rewiring your whole house. This guy just has no idea how electricity works and wants to blame somebody for a big bill. They "don't care" because they are not responsible.
He was probably a ‘not so bright’ technician that drilled that hole from the inside out without checking where they were drilling. Cable guys are the absolute worst.
As a DIY homeowner I found 90% of the problems were from half-ass jobs left behind and mishaps are just lurking to happen. Personally I have very little respect for so-called pros who always look for short-cuts and then it becomes someone else's problem down the road.
Some of those installers will take the quickest way to get done but I’m with you it sure saves on drill bits if it was de energized beforehand. Btw send a little of that heat north I’m tired of building fires 😊
Based on this video and a lot of the comments, it really seems like there needs to be some sort of law that requires cable/phone companies to use certified tradesmen for their technicians. Seems like anyone with half a brain would know not to go drilling holes and slapping wires in a high-voltage electrical box dedicated to the AC unit.
looks like AT&T fiber optic cable, FTTH (fiber to the home) for internet service. I bet they drilled from inside the house out into the box and nicked a wire, throwing a shower of sparks and tripped the breaker. then just finished the install and left to not get in trouble. 🙄 dumb-bells. that said, I'd have checked the wire carefully, I'm sure there's a bare spot and the above is exactly what they did, because I have seen similar many times, where they hit water, drain, vent, ducts, refrigerant lines, wires of all sorts. not just att, but all the installers for phone, internet, satellite, etc. they just don't have the foresight and experience to eyeball where the stuff will fall and visualize what could be in the walls.
yep AT&T fiber optics, confirmed later in video, the only good thing, it's non-conductive fiber optic cabling, right to the back of modem, where it terminates to a plug into a transceiver.
i like how you address your customers as "Sir" & "Ma'am" I will add that to my repertoire. It is friendly & respectful, yet it sets the relationship as being professional. Not blurring the lines between friendship & work. I am a little to friendly sometimes & i feel like customers feel the right to lowball me because of it!!
A pleasure to watch some good & quick troubleshooting. Anyone else might have suspected a potential problem with the system. I like the fact that your curiosity made you investigate that strange cable run into the disconnect. Thanks for the video, I like your style and I hope AT&T does the right thing for this customer (victim).
In all my years of electrical work, I have seen some strange stuff.. But this deal hear, is one of the issues that will actually drive me MAD.. Routing through an isolated system, BECAUSE it was easier for the tech... OH NO, not on any of my work you won't. I had a customer that had some fancy swimming pool control system, that a network company poked a hole through, right into a $25K control system, and SMOKED IT.. Which the direct result of that, was this salt water electrolysis convert and multiple pump system ended up running full tilt, and the metering sensors where basically taken out of the loop to turn them on/off, accordingly, smoked the salt water converter unit, COOKED IT... The pumps ran so hot, those motors/pumps are NEMA class sealed, but, also COOKED, to the point of being seized up, as the control valves that are controlled by the controller, were not tripped to open to run fresh cool water through and the water that was trapped in the closed circuit plumbing, was now a pressure cooker/vessel, and boiled... The network company's insurance covered it, but, all said and done, to demo out all the damaged system, to install a system that is designed to care for itself, for a 50 year life span, came out to approx $910K.... LOL... Lets not forget the time that the home owner had to be away from the house to allow the massive construction teams to bust up 8 triaxle dump truck loads of concrete... It was a mess for them for 4 months, and the entire summer, GONE.. Never even got to use their pool system and hot-tubes.... So much more in damages.. All because of a tech drilling a hole in through somebody else's equipment. LOL If I remember correctly, the entail cost to install the pool systems, was like $80K or something like that... But holy cow, to dig everything up and redo it all... I am glad I do not install pool systems.. I'll stick to being a wirenut...
The installers have basically zero training. They're told to run the wire from point A to point B anyway they can and they do! It's not like the ATT or Bell installers of 40 years ago when they were actual well trained installers who knew exactly what they were doing and gave a shit about the work. Today they hire people off the street and give them like one day of training then send them out with a fist full of work orders.
Many installers are contractors and get paid by the jobs completed. And do what they need to to regardless of the consequences and rather it is proper or not. Shoddy workmanship is job 1 for them. Get in, get out, get paid. Leave the mess for someone else.
I know I've officially reached old man status when my auto-play algorithm took me to this video from comedy videogame videos, and I still watched the whole thing.
if you look at the jack the wall around it is buckled inward to the house, i'd bet they drilled from the outside in. like others i'd hire an electrician to replace it all and have them come out and redo it while the elctrician is there and it would be on att's dime for everything.
How Frontier dose it is they ask where you like it to be installed and the first thing we do is add the box on the side of the home and then the drop gets put inside their. We are not allowed to touch anything else but are own stuff. Anytime I do a new install with a drop I run it from the home to are equipment but many do it the other way. It doesn't matter but this way you can get a straight shot to the road without any issues. We also install by the ground the the home has unless the customer as the electrical company put in a different one. We do not mess with anything that's not ares.
Had a similar call earlier today, bad relay/board in a Generac delay box. Replaced a weak capacitor on the condenser since I was there and told him to let the company that installed the Generator system know about the relay I bypassed when they come do THEIR maintenance next week.
The electrical contractor I used to work for would sometimes get called to make repairs after the cable installers F'd up... One time they put an "installers bit" right through a 200A service entrance! Luckily it only blew the bit up and nothing more, but the service between the meter and panel had to get replaced.
Dish installed satellite TV in my parents house probably 15 years or so ago. Installer ran the coaxial straight through one of the vents in the brickwork around the base of the house. Maybe a year later we had someone install Dish's satellite internet and that Installer just shook his head at it. Long story short we got a crawlspace vent we can't shut in the winter time.
As an entry level AC guy, I barely like getting my hands much less tools around those disconnect wires. I couldn’t imagine drilling a hole right next to those wires. Electricity is a scary thing lol. That installer must not have much knowledge on anything.
I’d make them come back and relocate the wire. 1 high and low voltage in a box is a not code. 2 water will get in the disconnect from being open. 3 How long do you think it will be before someone jams the cover shut and cuts the wire sticking out of the door. That AT&T install belongs on the wall of shame.
I installed cable TV back in the 80's and when I went to screw on a 75 Ohm matching transformer to the back of the TV, it burned off the connector with a FLASH. So I put a meter on the 2 screws and found 120 Volts AC. I red tagged the TV and told the customer I cant leave the box there till they get a new TV or this one repaired as it had 120v at my antenna connection.
I had Comcast run a coax cable across my floor in the middle if the room about 15 feet long, it was not in the corner and stapled down, it was loose and able to be tripped over. I told the tech to at least run it up and over the ceiling across the entryway, but he said they couldn't and leaving it loose on the floor was ok. Lazy lazy people in the world!
AT&T sucks. I’ve helped my grandma with her Wi-Fi like setting up a UniFi system and because I didn’t feel like changing the Amazon echos over to the UniFi system, they were on the old router and when the AT&T person replaced the router and they weren’t connected BLAMED it on the system I installed. Rediculous they have been doing this kind of stuff to her multiple times. They are highly unprofessional and poorly trained. This is a example of them being clueless at what they are doing like usual
That guy drilled through from the inside without checking if anything was in the way first. FYI, those cable guys are often undertrained when new. They put them out on jobs alone before they should be.
Coming from a Spectrum maintenance technician that worked in a shared service area with AT&T. Something this negligible had to have been caused by a contractor. They don’t care what happens to a customers home as long as they are in and out in 30 minutes or less. I know from spectrum’s training that we try to avoid drilling near AC Condensers at all costs and the only time we would ever touch them is to attach a exterior grounded clamp IF and only IF we can visually verify a path to ground and there is no other preferable path to ground. Then we take photos of our work and request sup. Approval which is 9/10 always denied. I also know at least with spectrum that because this wasn’t caught within 30 days, the technician is no longer responsible for your house anyway. AT&T might still pay up just to shut you up but at the end of they day they don’t care cause, what are you gonna do? Switch to cable? See you in 3 months. Sad I know.
Dude. I like your videos. I'm in Texas and it's hot enough to make you cuss. A guy I used in the past didn't pull the drain plug from the motor he installed. This was found out by another company.
Not sure, but it kinda looked like that paint on the inside was starting to bubble. Assuming you guys are a bit more humid there then Colorado. Isn't there some sort of moisture barrier needed?
In cases like that you should give them a written statement of cause, and or a quote on top of the work you do. Because they could take that and file a small claims court case against them to pay you for the repairs they shouldn't of had to do, since another corporation caused the damage.
And the homeowner so clueless he didn't know to check for a tripped breaker also didn't bother to check how the cable installer ran the cable. Serious lack of man skills right there.
The irony here is that the placement of the interior panel is absolute shit and if they'd placed it in a more discreet spot they'd have not only done no damage to anything, it would have looked 100x better. I seriously can't stand places that just throw phone/cable/fiber jacks in the middle of the wall for no reason.
Good job Ted. I used to live in Spartanburg, early 2000's. If youtube was around then, I would have loved to have found and worked for you sir. 15yrs install, service, retro, management experience
It’s an odd world we live in People call a technician before they check the breaker panel, but then again I’ve had people tow their car to me after the oil pan ripped off and they tried to drive it to Walmart for an oil change when the oil light came on.
That is the craziest fiber optic installation I've seen. if it wasn't for the fact that the customer needs to put AT&T on the hook as the responsible party for the damages and cost incurred, never mind their management tracking down which technician did that and reprimanding them, I would have given that wire The Big Snip. At least with some of the more conventional Telecom wiring it's easy enough to undo it and move it, fiber optic can be a bit more involved sometimes.
As an electrican I woulda called the company to come fix it correctly and yanked it out of my box. Also woulda called the building inspector. That is a big NEC violation to have data in an electrical box with power.
AT&T routed their fiber right through a tree in our yard and then told us that it would cost $1K to replace a broken line. On top of that, he INSISTED on installing the ONT on the opposite side of the house from all my existing network gear citing that "he can't waste cable going through the attic and that it often gets broken up there". Then he asks if he can throw is waste away in our garbage can. What did we find in the garbage can? A whole spool of unused fiber cable... We also found his tools on a window seal. Mine now. Lazy, incompetent, lier who didn't rout the new cable along with the existing cables or rout it to my existing equipment because he didn't want to crawl through the attic.
As a Commercial UNION HVAC guy of 33 yrs,, 1st,, I’d bet that’s against Code,,2nd,, I would have checked all components to ground on that line side… if everything appeared ok and then I thought that breaker was tripped from the AT&T company drilling a hole to run there cable,,Just to protect my company and myself of not being responsible for any damage ,or threat of Fire inside the wall,would recommend opening that wall,,have a licensed Electrician check the wiring ,contact the Township Inspector and force AT&T to re-route there wire and any and all expense paid by AT&T. Just gotta cover your butt!! Imagine resetting line voltage to a shorted wire in the wall,from the drill and it caused a spark inside the wall and the Homeowners house caught of fire !
There may be a bare wire in the wall where a search bit may have been sent?🤔 Thanks again for the videos! Stay safe. Retired (werk'n)keyboard super tech. Wear your safety glasses!
Did they Hit the Line in the wall , Now the Wire has Reduced Amperage capability . arcing and sparking in the wall ? Should be a little more investigation .
I had cable installed 9 months ago. The installer ran an aerial line from the pole in the alley to the deck of my house, crossing my driveway diagonally. The height of the drop at its lowest point (dead center of my driveway) was 8 feet above the concrete. I have a camper on my pickup. The line has been ripped down 9 times and 9 different technicians from the cable company has come out to repair it. The last time it was fixed properly because the electrical inspector was at the house next door and saw what was going on. The inspector advised the last repair technician that any wire/fiber cable that crossed over a driveway must be a minimum of 14 feet above the driveway per NEC. After I showed the inspector the receipts for all the previous repairs and the initial install she cited the cable company with 19 violations - one (1) installation without a permit, nine (9) repairs without a permit and nine (9) installation violations. $12,035.00 total fines for the cable company!
All that probably could have been avoided by the initial installer doing a midspan instead of coming straight off the pole. I dont know if it would have been a lot higher but at least it wouldnt have crossed the driveway. 8 foot off the ground in most municipalities is a code violation in and of itself but you see it all the time. does your main electrical connection also cross your driveway?
LOL. Perfect!! I love it!!! My neighbors electrical drop ran diagonally across my from yard and my driveway where I parked my travel trailer and accessed my gate to my back yard. My neighbor was a sweet 93 year old lady, great neighbor that we watched over like our own family. We purchased a 42 foot 5th wheel camper that has a 13'6 height clearance. The neighbor's city power drop was 10'6". Well, I contacted the city utility company (small city, everyone pretty much knows everybody) and advised there was an issue with the drop. The utility manager came out and we reviewed the issue. BTW, I had already researched the "easement" the easement on my property is for my service, not anyone else's. I didn't want to be difficult, so I offered a location on my property for a utility pole to be placed to allow the drop to be clear of my camper. The camper would be under the drop when parked, and would limit my ability to work on the roof of the camper, but I wanted to make it easy. The utility manager told me the pole would cost me $1500. I said "no it won't, it will cost the utility Dept." He didn't comment. He then said, "well, you can hire an electrician to raise your neighbors weatherhead." I told him that won't be necessary. He looked at me funny and I told him that the weathered already was longer/ freestanding than code permits, that the city utilities' easement can not prohibit free use of my property so the issue is the cities and they have two weeks to resolve it as that is when I take delivery of the 5th wheel and I will have free access of my property. The manager looked at me, looked down, and he said "you did your homework, didn't you?". The next day when I came home from work, I had full access to my property. My 93 year old neighbor sat in her chair in the carport the whole time giggling. Don't let utility companies take advantage of you for their pure laziness and lack of doing things correctly.
For that AT&T installer to knowingly place a low-voltage cable in a 220v electrical cabinet should be fired. He KNEW it went through that cabinet because it's stuffed through the front of the box.
There's no voltage at all in the ATT cable. It's fiber. But still the installation looks like shit, as usual. Notice the bulging in the drywall on the inside next to the fiber port.
As a cable installer they drilled from inside without checking what was on the other side. My line of work is not known for having the best and brightest.
I call bullshit. We do have some idiots with no common sense. I have never done this in 30 years of cable work.
Then I hope that guy lost a diaper when he came outside!
Yup, so many people drill from the inside without even walking outside to guage what's on the other side. I've seen this before. Hell, I even did it myself. I was screwing a medicine cabinet up in a tenants bathroom, and they installed the damn breaker panel on the other side of the wall, Zip! Right through a breaker. Loud ass pop, blew the breaker, I'm glad I didn't have my hand on the bit like I normally do, I believe the drill insulated me from the power. I went right through 220v dual pole breaker. 😂 I can laugh about it now, but it scared the hell out of me.
I hope it fried his Black and Decker drill.
I don't know what is worse. Having Larry the cable guy drill holes all over your house, or have the neighbors dog barking constantly.
My sister had cable installed in brand new home, for over 9 months she always wondered why she had a sewer gas odor. I taller drilled dead center thru 3” sewer stack and ran wire thru it. Over $10,000 in damage. Cable company tried to deny they were at fault.
Hard to hide a wire going through a pipe! Guess they tried to say the homeowner must have moved it.
10k to replace a piece of 3” pipe?
Them cable guys aren’t smart from what I’ve heard here
How did damages cost $10,000?
@@s.c.o.s4672that does seem excessive, but between the actual repair, the drywall work, texture matching, repainting the wall from corner to corner, etc. I can easily see $3k
That’s against NEC to run it through the disconnect!
Also it is not permitted to run fibrouptic cable at close radius as shown as going through the door cover!
I discount rate on a nuisance call further shows what a stand-up, fair, caring, company you run.
Had my well pump replaced a few years back. I use a 110v submersible pump. He switched it to a 220v pump, and wanted to tap into my AC unit for power. And warned me to not run both at the same time. That was a fun day. He had no choice but to drive 60 miles round trip to get the right pump and reinstall it. Also came back the next day because every single fitting leaked. This is a guy that's been in business for over 40 years.
Similar screw ups happen in my area too...We built a custom home with heavy shake roof for a customer and installed flashed hard pipe through the roof to allow for mounting satellite tv dish on the roof and routing of cable through the pipe into the attic. Cable guys came , installed the dish directly to the roof with lag bolts through the heavy shakes and ran the cable down the roof to the gutter and under the roof eve then through the wall...they didn't touch the galvanized pipe we installed for mounting the dish and cable, we didn't see them install the antenna but we did shower them with a few choice words prior to their leaving the job.
We also had a dish installer think he was going to install the dish on our new roof. I said absolutely not. He then said he would install it on the siding. I said you're not drilling thru my siding. He ended up putting 4x4 into the ground and attached to that.
@@onenikkione Check out the Commdeck (Retro Deck) Roof Dish Mounting System I used when I reroofed my house.
Looks like the existing wiring would violate any fire or safety code, preventing the box cover from closing and not being secured. Kudos for giving the customer a price break!
As a home owner I think I would check my breaker first inside then see if the disconnect was tripped as well then I would call for service
A lot of people don’t have the slightest bit of knowledge for basic things like that. I’m 23 and the last thing I’m going to do is call for someone’s service. I’m doing every bit of internet learning before I have someone come out lol. But the breaker is always the first thing you should check when something big like that isn’t working.
I had to run an antenna line into a bedroom once, and the guy said "Please do a better job than the Directv guy did". He showed me where a hole was drilled through the baseboard opposite a closet. There is an open pocket door there with a matching 3/8" hole drilled through it also...
I can't imagine how dumb that installer was, but wow. I'm not an HVAC guy, but I am a landlord - some of the weirdest damage I encounter in the houses is caused by satellite and cable installers. It just doesn't make sense sometimes, but it almost always looks terrible.
My Mom has two rent houses (my grandpa's old house and the one he built beside it) and they have flat roofs.
Direct TV/Dish Network "installer" threw his dish up on the roof and ran lags directly into the NEW flat roof . *facepalm*
I saw this happen and the guy drilled through the 220 wire that fed the disconnect so we had to cut the drywall open inside and repair. The cable and phone guys are creative little buggers
you should change the disconnect, run a new wire, make them move the fiber cable and they should reimburse the customer or pay you directly.
they knew damned well what they did, as I guaranteed it killed the drill bit.
I myself have hit live wiring in the past and it practically removes the whole drill bit end, especially appliances and other hard wired things, with high current breakers and no AFCI/GFCI protection.
For sure the feed cable has been compromised and needs to be replaced. No telling how much the drill bit reduced the current carrying capacity of the cable. A hot spot could lead to a fire as the air conditioning season progresses. ATT had no business going through that disconnect.
It's the smart move, but he's probably busy up to the gills in calls. I love having the time to do a job right, but sometimes you get so busy you do the job, 'up to code'. Maybe you come back once the immediate safety issue is addressed.
I love that van with the way the sides open
Wish they still made them like that.
...that's the reason ol Ted still drives the oldest vehicle in his fleet.
Barking dog's owner eventually tells it to shut up.
Might want to address those bare wires in the disconnect that got tore-up by AT&T's drill bit (yeah, could see bare copper and tore insulation in your video @ 5:55). Pretty obvious, though, that dude didn't drill from the outside of the house... he found a nice place to put his modem inside and didn't bother to check for obstacles on the other side of the wall. He realized his mistake once he went outside to feed the cable but knew the homeowner would be a little angry if he had to punch a second hole the wall (leaving his first hole exposed) so he just didn't say anything. Since the drill bit grounded one of the hot legs to the disconnect box outside the house while he was drilling from inside, he couldn't have seen the spark so he figured it was still good.
NEC 725-54.
That is a violation, plain and simple.
I really do have to say, this guy is very polite and professional with his job. You can tell he really loves his job from how seriously he takes it too.
I Literally just figured out after watching this video, why my ac conditioner wasn’t working, it hadn’t occurred to me to check the breaker box for a problem originally, not until I had heard it mentioned in this video and I was stunned because it was a trip in the breaker box and I have you to thank for giving me the clue and saving me some cash.👍
Xfinity destroyed all the electrical in my house, which included almost everything plugged in including the air conditioner. Just to rewire the house cost $24,700. Total so far has been over $62,000 of damage. Both Xfinity and their insurance company don't care. Their insurance company spent about 5 hours in total inspecting the damage over several visits, but did not even open up one plug sockets that I saw. If they did, they would have seen several of the grounds had melted. Sloppy. They did not even bring in an electrical engineer to check the system out. As I said, they really don't care.
What did they do that somehow destroyed your electrical wiring or equipment?
@@court2379 Yeah, that story doesn't add up at all. That's not how wiring works. I cannot *possibly* think of a situation that internet wires could cause that would require rewiring your whole house. This guy just has no idea how electricity works and wants to blame somebody for a big bill. They "don't care" because they are not responsible.
@@court2379 More information will be presented in court in September. Then it will be placed on TH-cam.
Holly crapshoot. I'd interested to know what they did that caused all of your ground connections to melt. The doesn't make any sense.
@@thogevoll If I was a betting man, I would guess that they somehow bridged the house primary to the main earth tie.
An HONEST AC company, probably rare these days.
That AT&T wire run is incredibly sloppy! I just had fiber installed and they did a very neat job, thank goodness.
I used to work for AT&T back when we followed BSP's (Bell System practices).
He was probably a ‘not so bright’ technician that drilled that hole from the inside out without checking where they were drilling. Cable guys are the absolute worst.
Bullshit! He is not a cable guy. He works for AT&T!
Yea I believe that’s what happened
They didn’t look what was on the other side
The 240v line inside the wall might have been hit by a drill. The home owner should have the wall opened by an electrician, to take a look.
Electrician here, cant see really well but at 5:53 the wire thats right next to the fiber appears nicked and discolored.
@@holyscrap4445 I slowed the video down around there, the white conductors' insulation also looks like it has been *very* toasty at some point.
As a DIY homeowner I found 90% of the problems were from half-ass jobs left behind and mishaps are just lurking to happen. Personally I have very little respect for so-called pros who always look for short-cuts and then it becomes someone else's problem down the road.
Some of those installers will take the quickest way to get done but I’m with you it sure saves on drill bits if it was de energized beforehand. Btw send a little of that heat north I’m tired of building fires 😊
Based on this video and a lot of the comments, it really seems like there needs to be some sort of law that requires cable/phone companies to use certified tradesmen for their technicians. Seems like anyone with half a brain would know not to go drilling holes and slapping wires in a high-voltage electrical box dedicated to the AC unit.
looks like AT&T fiber optic cable, FTTH (fiber to the home) for internet service.
I bet they drilled from inside the house out into the box and nicked a wire, throwing a shower of sparks and tripped the breaker. then just finished the install and left to not get in trouble. 🙄 dumb-bells.
that said, I'd have checked the wire carefully, I'm sure there's a bare spot and the above is exactly what they did, because I have seen similar many times, where they hit water, drain, vent, ducts, refrigerant lines, wires of all sorts. not just att, but all the installers for phone, internet, satellite, etc. they just don't have the foresight and experience to eyeball where the stuff will fall and visualize what could be in the walls.
yep AT&T fiber optics, confirmed later in video, the only good thing, it's non-conductive fiber optic cabling, right to the back of modem, where it terminates to a plug into a transceiver.
You are as absolutely correct .That installer may have damaged the electric line. May look ok but could be a fire waiting to happen.
i like how you address your customers as "Sir" & "Ma'am" I will add that to my repertoire. It is friendly & respectful, yet it sets the relationship as being professional. Not blurring the lines between friendship & work. I am a little to friendly sometimes & i feel like customers feel the right to lowball me because of it!!
No fear of spiderwebs! Doesn't even knock them down first, just goes right in.
A pleasure to watch some good & quick troubleshooting. Anyone else might have suspected a potential problem with the system. I like the fact that your curiosity made you investigate that strange cable run into the disconnect. Thanks for the video, I like your style and I hope AT&T does the right thing for this customer (victim).
In all my years of electrical work, I have seen some strange stuff.. But this deal hear, is one of the issues that will actually drive me MAD.. Routing through an isolated system, BECAUSE it was easier for the tech... OH NO, not on any of my work you won't. I had a customer that had some fancy swimming pool control system, that a network company poked a hole through, right into a $25K control system, and SMOKED IT.. Which the direct result of that, was this salt water electrolysis convert and multiple pump system ended up running full tilt, and the metering sensors where basically taken out of the loop to turn them on/off, accordingly, smoked the salt water converter unit, COOKED IT... The pumps ran so hot, those motors/pumps are NEMA class sealed, but, also COOKED, to the point of being seized up, as the control valves that are controlled by the controller, were not tripped to open to run fresh cool water through and the water that was trapped in the closed circuit plumbing, was now a pressure cooker/vessel, and boiled... The network company's insurance covered it, but, all said and done, to demo out all the damaged system, to install a system that is designed to care for itself, for a 50 year life span, came out to approx $910K.... LOL... Lets not forget the time that the home owner had to be away from the house to allow the massive construction teams to bust up 8 triaxle dump truck loads of concrete... It was a mess for them for 4 months, and the entire summer, GONE.. Never even got to use their pool system and hot-tubes.... So much more in damages.. All because of a tech drilling a hole in through somebody else's equipment. LOL
If I remember correctly, the entail cost to install the pool systems, was like $80K or something like that... But holy cow, to dig everything up and redo it all... I am glad I do not install pool systems.. I'll stick to being a wirenut...
The installers have basically zero training. They're told to run the wire from point A to point B anyway they can and they do! It's not like the ATT or Bell installers of 40 years ago when they were actual well trained installers who knew exactly what they were doing and gave a shit about the work. Today they hire people off the street and give them like one day of training then send them out with a fist full of work orders.
He was close to getting a good wake up call.
Some "so called" professionals need to find new careers. Keep the content coming!
Under-appreciated line of work. Thanks for keeping it cool!
That is the way AT&T goes these days!
Many installers are contractors and get paid by the jobs completed. And do what they need to to regardless of the consequences and rather it is proper or not. Shoddy workmanship is job 1 for them. Get in, get out, get paid. Leave the mess for someone else.
Homeowner needs to call AT&T and a flooring guy 🥴 that floor install looks awful.
I know I've officially reached old man status when my auto-play algorithm took me to this video from comedy videogame videos, and I still watched the whole thing.
*Wow those damn loud barking dogs, people are rude as heck today leaving their dogs out to yap all day and NIGHT long!*
SOUNDS LIKE A PIT BULL TOO!
if you look at the jack the wall around it is buckled inward to the house, i'd bet they drilled from the outside in. like others i'd hire an electrician to replace it all and have them come out and redo it while the elctrician is there and it would be on att's dime for everything.
How Frontier dose it is they ask where you like it to be installed and the first thing we do is add the box on the side of the home and then the drop gets put inside their. We are not allowed to touch anything else but are own stuff. Anytime I do a new install with a drop I run it from the home to are equipment but many do it the other way. It doesn't matter but this way you can get a straight shot to the road without any issues. We also install by the ground the the home has unless the customer as the electrical company put in a different one. We do not mess with anything that's not ares.
Had a similar call earlier today, bad relay/board in a Generac delay box.
Replaced a weak capacitor on the condenser since I was there and told him to let the company that installed the Generator system know about the relay I bypassed when they come do THEIR maintenance next week.
The electrical contractor I used to work for would sometimes get called to make repairs after the cable installers F'd up... One time they put an "installers bit" right through a 200A service entrance!
Luckily it only blew the bit up and nothing more, but the service between the meter and panel had to get replaced.
I enjoy all your videos,,,,like your style.
Time to take AT&T to court!
“and it is hot” definitely heard that before, and I wish it was hot here. It snowed today lol
Dish installed satellite TV in my parents house probably 15 years or so ago. Installer ran the coaxial straight through one of the vents in the brickwork around the base of the house. Maybe a year later we had someone install Dish's satellite internet and that Installer just shook his head at it. Long story short we got a crawlspace vent we can't shut in the winter time.
As an entry level AC guy, I barely like getting my hands much less tools around those disconnect wires. I couldn’t imagine drilling a hole right next to those wires. Electricity is a scary thing lol. That installer must not have much knowledge on anything.
I always talk to the people that work on my house where I rent from I always think it’s nice to talk with people
I’d make them come back and relocate the wire. 1 high and low voltage in a box is a not code. 2 water will get in the disconnect from being open. 3 How long do you think it will be before someone jams the cover shut and cuts the wire sticking out of the door. That AT&T install belongs on the wall of shame.
Lots going on down south as they are running fiber, they have 3rd party crews doing the work, cutting sprinklers, power waterline and everything
AT&T will just say homeowner should have checked his own breaker.
And that fine piece of work was done by a telecom professional, not a DIYer. 😀
Hey Ted! Been watching your content for a while. I do enjoy seeing the "helicopters" lol. Glad to see your Subs are growing as well.
I'm more impressed with the way the service van is set up
It's U-verse Ted. It's the only service that uses fiber-optic cable. I used to have it in Georgia before. I moved to Texas.
Ted, I see some of that kind of "jacklegging" all the time! Some of those cable contractors just know enough to be dangerous!
I love winter. Summer is way to humid here in south Mississippi lol
I installed cable TV back in the 80's and when I went to screw on a 75 Ohm matching transformer to the back of the TV, it burned off the connector with a FLASH. So I put a meter on the 2 screws and found 120 Volts AC. I red tagged the TV and told the customer I cant leave the box there till they get a new TV or this one repaired as it had 120v at my antenna connection.
Are we just gonna let the homeowner off the hook here for not even checking the circuit panel before calling an HVAC guy ? Just wow.
Tired of winter? I hope you’re kidding. Come to Minnesota, hit 60° once since last October, haha
I had Comcast run a coax cable across my floor in the middle if the room about 15 feet long, it was not in the corner and stapled down, it was loose and able to be tripped over. I told the tech to at least run it up and over the ceiling across the entryway, but he said they couldn't and leaving it loose on the floor was ok. Lazy lazy people in the world!
AT&T sucks. I’ve helped my grandma with her Wi-Fi like setting up a UniFi system and because I didn’t feel like changing the Amazon echos over to the UniFi system, they were on the old router and when the AT&T person replaced the router and they weren’t connected BLAMED it on the system I installed. Rediculous they have been doing this kind of stuff to her multiple times. They are highly unprofessional and poorly trained. This is a example of them being clueless at what they are doing like usual
Unbelieveable what you find in the field. Scary stuff! Easy $$ for you on this one
That guy drilled through from the inside without checking if anything was in the way first.
FYI, those cable guys are often undertrained when new. They put them out on jobs alone before they should be.
Coming from a Spectrum maintenance technician that worked in a shared service area with AT&T. Something this negligible had to have been caused by a contractor. They don’t care what happens to a customers home as long as they are in and out in 30 minutes or less. I know from spectrum’s training that we try to avoid drilling near AC Condensers at all costs and the only time we would ever touch them is to attach a exterior grounded clamp IF and only IF we can visually verify a path to ground and there is no other preferable path to ground. Then we take photos of our work and request sup. Approval which is 9/10 always denied. I also know at least with spectrum that because this wasn’t caught within 30 days, the technician is no longer responsible for your house anyway. AT&T might still pay up just to shut you up but at the end of they day they don’t care cause, what are you gonna do? Switch to cable? See you in 3 months. Sad I know.
It’s called, LAZINESS!
I didn’t know u were in SC! I’ll probably be calling you sometime lol
Nice troubleshooting and good job ... Thx ...
He's gonna be on the phone with AT&T until the cows come home... they will never take responsibility for that
AT&T installers have been wreaking havoc in Southern Louisiana. I have been having several of those same situations occur
Dude. I like your videos. I'm in Texas and it's hot enough to make you cuss. A guy I used in the past didn't pull the drain plug from the motor he installed. This was found out by another company.
Man that is unacceptable and unusual for ATT. Looks like the new fiber optic cable.
_unusual?_ You must not be familiar with today's at&t. Not your father's or your childhood one.
I use to get those calls, you made me come out so now it's your turn. Snip snip. Lol
Not sure, but it kinda looked like that paint on the inside was starting to bubble. Assuming you guys are a bit more humid there then Colorado. Isn't there some sort of moisture barrier needed?
In cases like that you should give them a written statement of cause, and or a quote on top of the work you do. Because they could take that and file a small claims court case against them to pay you for the repairs they shouldn't of had to do, since another corporation caused the damage.
I'd be livid if a cable installer ran a cable like that at my home
And the homeowner so clueless he didn't know to check for a tripped breaker also didn't bother to check how the cable installer ran the cable. Serious lack of man skills right there.
The irony here is that the placement of the interior panel is absolute shit and if they'd placed it in a more discreet spot they'd have not only done no damage to anything, it would have looked 100x better.
I seriously can't stand places that just throw phone/cable/fiber jacks in the middle of the wall for no reason.
6:10ish looks like the red wire in the disconnect got all chomped up from the moron drilling trough it - pretty sure i see copper exposed
Good job Ted. I used to live in Spartanburg, early 2000's. If youtube was around then, I would have loved to have found and worked for you sir. 15yrs install, service, retro, management experience
Very cool!
It’s an odd world we live in
People call a technician before they check the breaker panel, but then again I’ve had people tow their car to me after the oil pan ripped off and they tried to drive it to Walmart for an oil change when the oil light came on.
That is the craziest fiber optic installation I've seen.
if it wasn't for the fact that the customer needs to put AT&T on the hook as the responsible party for the damages and cost incurred, never mind their management tracking down which technician did that and reprimanding them, I would have given that wire The Big Snip. At least with some of the more conventional Telecom wiring it's easy enough to undo it and move it, fiber optic can be a bit more involved sometimes.
Obviously they Nicked the wire and Shorted it to ground...
You should go back and fix the damaged wire...
AT&T guy drilled his hole from inside and didn't bother to check what was on the other side. He's lucky he didn't start a fire or get shocked.
As an electrican I woulda called the company to come fix it correctly and yanked it out of my box. Also woulda called the building inspector. That is a big NEC violation to have data in an electrical box with power.
Combo Breaker! That has to be a record for number of code and practice violations…
AT&T routed their fiber right through a tree in our yard and then told us that it would cost $1K to replace a broken line. On top of that, he INSISTED on installing the ONT on the opposite side of the house from all my existing network gear citing that "he can't waste cable going through the attic and that it often gets broken up there". Then he asks if he can throw is waste away in our garbage can. What did we find in the garbage can? A whole spool of unused fiber cable... We also found his tools on a window seal. Mine now.
Lazy, incompetent, lier who didn't rout the new cable along with the existing cables or rout it to my existing equipment because he didn't want to crawl through the attic.
As a Commercial UNION HVAC guy of 33 yrs,, 1st,, I’d bet that’s against Code,,2nd,, I would have checked all components to ground on that line side… if everything appeared ok and then I thought that breaker was tripped from the AT&T company drilling a hole to run there cable,,Just to protect my company and myself of not being responsible for any damage ,or threat of Fire inside the wall,would recommend opening that wall,,have a licensed Electrician check the wiring ,contact the Township Inspector and force AT&T to re-route there wire and any and all expense paid by AT&T. Just gotta cover your butt!! Imagine resetting line voltage to a shorted wire in the wall,from the drill and it caused a spark inside the wall and the Homeowners house caught of fire !
Running a phone wire through a disconnect? That's Jive!
Just think about the electrical interference from the high voltage wires interrupting the service
@@joshuatimmons467 In this case it's fiber so there shouldn't be any interference.
@@joshuatimmons467 That's actually not an issue, that is a fiber optic cable.
@@joshuatimmons467 It's fiber, it won't be affected. Regardless it's a subpar job.
@@joshuatimmons467 Good thing electricity doesn't interfere with light.
@5:54 -wire insulation looks damaged by drill bit as you indicated
I don’t understand why people still use ATT. I quit using them 20 years ago
I hope the homeowner had ATT come back out and fix that. That is not acceptable on multiple levels!
That installer did not know what he was doing.
There may be a bare wire in the wall where a search bit may have been sent?🤔
Thanks again for the videos!
Stay safe.
Retired (werk'n)keyboard super tech. Wear your safety glasses!
Did they Hit the Line in the wall , Now the Wire has Reduced Amperage capability . arcing and sparking in the wall ? Should be a little more investigation .