Number of days for Locate renewals.

**underground quester** · July 7th, 2008, 03:21 AM

Here is Alberta the 1 call consortium has moved to 30 day locates from 14 days with a few conditions attached.

If the ground has not been disturbed within 14 days of the original locate then contractor must request locate every 14 days. If the ground disturbance has commenced within 14 days the locate is valid for 30 days from the original locate date, subject to conditions:

Condition 1)
Original locate marks must be visible or the ground disturber has provided more permanent references or the facility has been exposed (potholed)

Condition 2)
Ground disturbers activity at the site has not been interrupted for more than 4 calendar days or over weekends or if the weather dictates longer interruptions. During periods of inactivity, monitoring of the site must be maintained.

Condition 3)
The ground disturbers presence at the site remains evident during such interruptions.

What are other people seeing in their areas?
Have 28 or 30 day tickets been around for some time?
If so, what kind of problems/issues do you see in regards to longer times?

At the moment, this new change seems to have cut in to our ticket volumes, not to mention my concerns about ongoing excavating and lack of any/little evidence left of flagging/paint.

**beyond help** · July 7th, 2008, 08:55 AM

We have 180 day project tickets. They only get recalled when the ticket is fully completed. Although these do have stipulations similar to yours. What a bunch of

**GWJ_CAS** · July 7th, 2008, 10:54 AM

Florida went from 20 day tickets to 30 day tickets. In doing so, they also removed another stipulation for work commencement; the statute used to say, "No less than two full business days and no more than five full business prior to beginning excavation, the excavator will contact the One Call System to request utility location".

Under the old way, the excavator had to renew the ticket by the seventeenth day, but had to begin work within five days (this helped to ensure fresh marks). The new way allows the excavator to call a ticket, wait 27 days before beginning work or calling in for a renewal (this is a problem for ensuring freshness of the marks). This created a problem for locators with regard to making sure marks last for 30 days since some contracts require refreshing marks before ticket expiration to be done for free.

This change has also had a negative impact on damages. An excavator can call for marks, wait 27 days to show up on site and could assume that facilities are clear if no marks are visible (because of fading, or rain, or other factors) and begin digging and have a damage...then the arguing over fault and payment for damages begins. For locate companies, this sucks, since most contract language requires the marks to last for the life of the ticket...and it is much easier for the utility to "collect" from the locate company (with whom they have a contract) than it is to collect from an excavator (with whom they have no contractual relationship). Yes, our law states that the excavator is responsible to call for re-marking if the marks are damaged, faded or obliterated, but if the excavator did not know the marks were even there, how could he know if they were obliterated?

The One Call Center touts itself as being a "Damage Prevention Entity" yet has passed legislation contrary to the whole Damage Prevention process because contractors complained that the system was to cumbersome...go figure.

IMHO, dig tickets should have a maximum life of 21 days and should have a requirement that excavation is started within 5 to 7 days to ensure marks are fresh, if not, the locator is no longer responsible for damages.

**yahoo** · July 7th, 2008, 08:03 PM

i will not complain about our system here.....ticket is good for 10 calender days....ug can you recharge the client if you have to remark....????

**underground quester** · July 7th, 2008, 09:42 PM

Originally Posted by yahoo

i will not complain about our system here.....ticket is good for 10 calender days....ug can you recharge the client if you have to remark....????

Yes.

**USIC1** · July 7th, 2008, 10:45 PM

Originally Posted by GWJ_CAS

The One Call Center touts itself as being a "Damage Prevention Entity" yet has passed legislation contrary to the whole Damage Prevention process because contractors complained that the system was to cumbersome...go figure.

This is why I dont give a frik and really the stuff in the ground is important but they dont care...I dont care...

Its just a job and why fight the system and worry about it...

I can be outa town in 2 hrs if I so choose and suggest the one foot out the door policy for any others in this contract locating fiasco...

Just makes me want to

and

**GasMan** · July 7th, 2008, 11:12 PM

ours is 14 buisness days

**TechMaster** · July 7th, 2008, 11:31 PM

10 days here also however if marks are destroyed the excavator must call in an update stateing this. Ok this is how it should work!!

How it really works is the excavators go out on the ninth day when the marking have already been destroyed and calls in a second request, which looks bad on th elocate company and also causes us to send a tech back out for FREE!!!

**LadyLeatherneck** · July 8th, 2008, 07:58 AM

Is there some really good reason that the locate companies are the ones who are paying for the weather? Seems no marking of any utilities should be free! Also seems a ticket should be done and over! If marks are needed again, contractor should have to call in another billable ticket. But who am I? What do I know? There's probably some really good explanation for why it is being done this way.

**Goldenboy** · August 10th, 2008, 08:28 AM

Our diggers tickets are good for 10 days. But this doesn't mean anything. I get 1 hour relocate tickets on jobs that were over a year old. It's frustrating how the system works.

Alot of contractors call our office direct for marks. I always call them and let them know I'll get to them when I can but I have to do the jobs that had called in tickets first. I can't jump for someone who didn't even call in a ticket.

**gypsygirl** · August 10th, 2008, 08:42 AM

Contractor has 14 days to START digging.. but a month for the life of the ticket. Doesn't make sense to me either. It used to be 14 days period. With all the construction going on and especially in the summer/winter months marks disappear quickly with mowing/snow fall.. what do they expect.

The law should be if a contractor shows up on site after his ticket is good, if he sees no marks and has not been notified by affected utilities listed, he should be required to call in a remark ticket. Generally there is some evidence of the locators having been on site.

I hate the "no show" tickets when contractor picks the most remote area of the site to look for marks... calls in "no show for all companies"... get over there and find out he's digging in back and had called for entire property.. your utilities are in front and they are all marked... idiot says.. "well you didn't have any okay's or marks back here!"

uh... duh... should this contractor even be in business?? Waste of time & money...

**justanotherlocator** · August 10th, 2008, 09:46 AM

It's worse when they call a no show for "all companies" and when you get there it's just one company that didn't show AND it's the one you DON'T locate for!!!

**sprayandpray** · August 10th, 2008, 06:20 PM

Originally Posted by justanotherlocator

It's worse when they call a no show for "all companies" and when you get there it's just one company that didn't show AND it's the one you DON'T locate for!!!

We get "No Response" tickets like this every day it seems. We only have 2 hours to respond and our customers also see these and want an explanation why we didn't respond to the 1st request!

Our marks are good for 14 days or whenever the contractor needs a re-mark. I just love re-marking long projects every week.