Repeated power outages - how to resolve root cause

[Caecilius]

My office has just had a power failure (one phase down, so lost power on one floor). We had low voltage (around 208v according to the UPS) from 15:00 and finally lost power at 19:30.

This is the third time it's happened the past couple of months. The office is only open between 8.00 AM and 5.00 PM, and UK power networks don't seem to want to take action unless there is someone at the premises.

The last couple of times I've been told that the problem was "a fuse at the substation" when it was finally resolved (which sounds like a simplified answer to me). It always seems to occur in the evening, but no one really cares until the following morning because the street is mainly offices. Then in the morning all hell breaks loose as people arrive and find the power out.

I'm generally the person who's reported it the night before as I have remote monitoring. But UK power networks want to wait until multiple people have reported it before it appears on their radar.

Has anyone got any thoughts on how to get to the bottom of this problem? It seems we just go round the same loop each time, and the underlying problem isn't getting fixed.

It seems like the person at the UK power networks helpline is trying to be helpful, but is just following a script and doesn't have the authority to do anything other than put notes on the call log.

Does anyone have any knowledge of how to get the root cause of these sorts of problems addressed?

[Martin Brown]

Can you correlate the failure time(s) and frequencies?

Major high power systems like sewage pumping stations coming online around 6.30pm was the trigger in my neck of the woods. YMMV

Club together with other disgruntled businesses, talk to the local TV channel and involve your MP - that tends to get their attention.

[Brian Reay]

We had a problem with our domestic supply some time back- frequent 'cuts' for an hour or two. Like you the help line seemed good but they didn't seem to be 'empowered' to get to the root of the problem.

We just asked to be referred to a supervisor and it was fixed in a day or so.

Having said that, it seems that there had been a major failure and we had been on a local generator and the cuts were due to it running out of fuel (or a some other issue causing it to cut out*). Someone, often us I suspect, reported the 'cut' and the fuel as topped up or the generator otherwise restarted. Whether the permanent fix was any quicker due to the intervention of the supervisor I can't be sure.

*I believe on one occasion the cables linking the generator to the main cable were stolen.

We've had similar problems with the 'phone lines when a duct was flooded and new cables had to be run. BT were a shambles until I contacted the Chief Exec.