Have you Ever.....

[Mke]

Have you ever located something you were not supposed to?

For example (hypotheticly of course)...

Have you marked another locators utility because it was not marked or marked incorrectly?

Or for you Rural guys marked a electrical feed to a well house for a homeowner even though you did not have to?


Reason being, I am in a weird position now to where I am no longer a contract locator and work for an agency that owns its own utilities. During design work as well as construction, we have noticed some lack of effort on local locators to mark their specific utilities. To their defense, there is always work going on and because of that maps of their utilities are not as helpful as they once were. (Moving major roads over 75' tends to complicated the maps since nothing lines up anymore.)

I called in a one call request for some drainage work and at the end of the third day I only had 3 of the seven utilities show up to mark, and out of those 7 I only recieved one call from one of the companies that marked the area.

To complicate things, we have been verbally B#!@ slapped for marking utility owned lines in this situation. All we care about is making sure everything is marked or at least conveyed to the contractor that it is unlocateable.

My main reason for asking is just to find out if other locators run into this situation and how they handle it.


Mke

[AULupstate]

I never located anything 'major' but say a secondary going from a house to a garage, things like that. Usually that was only due to the fact that nobody locates 'customer owned' but alot of times that is just what the dig safe ticket was for. White paint, only dots and conveyed to the homeowner that it was in no way shape or form a 'legal' locate.

As for Locators not showing up to do what their respective companies are contracted to do? Well make sure your ass is covered with dig safe and you completed your due dilligence and let your crews start digging away. I mean it sucks to say and some poor schmuck who is barely trained to do the job might get fired if something gets tagged but a picture gets painted of the Locate Company who apparently can't fullfil their contractual obligations.
Once you start locating in-house you have to ONLY worry about your stuff. It's a different animal all together.

(I know it sounds like I don't care about my fellow locators in the field but covering for others only leads to trouble)

[headcipher]

Only have one thing to say: Cover Your Butt!

If you put colored paint on anything that is not your facility you are responsible for the damage, as proved in court.

Check with your states excavating laws, you may be able to tell the excavator what he has to do in order to legally dig without being liable for damage to unlocated facilities. Here the contractor has to 2nd response the one-call and wait an hour for a response, after that liability falls on the facility owner or locator.

If you "accidentally" mark someone elses utility, make sure to black it out to avoid responsibility.

[yahoo]

don't totally understand the question????

[Wingfoot]

During design work - as well as construction - we have noticed some lack of effort on local locators to mark their specific utilities. My reason for asking is to find out how you handle it (design tickets). Mke

On real deep-dig tickets, I call to ask who is the on-sight foreman and what is his cell phone #. I then call that foreman for a meet to define the scope of the work, a starting point and a start date. I accurately locate and flag all the utilities I represent before the digging starts and stay ahead if it is an on-going project.

On design tickets, I get the greenest Noob to throw paint and flags. (I have exploited Paul, Amanda, Don, Dave, John, Tim, Charles and at least 20 other Noobs........ Hey....... I've been bent over and rode dry too!)

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