Frayed or sagging lines break easily, especially in high winds.

Look for signs of rotten wood on crossarms, check whether your poles are rotting at the base.

Keep trees away from power lines, they cause anything from flickering to a total outage if branches break.

Lines that have been repaired often need to be checked, it may be time to replace them.

Check the point where the service line enters your house - is the line old, repaired or frayed.

Don't Get Caught Out in a Storm

We've all come to know that 'severe weather events' can and do happen at any time, anywhere.

One of the worst consequences of a severe weather event can be loss of power to your home or business.

Counties Power is your local electricity distributor. Our responsibility is to maintain and repair the distribution network that brings the power to your gate.

But did you know that from your boundary you own and are responsible for the service line supplying electricity to your property. For many this is only a few meters of line, but in rural areas some properties have lines up to several hundred metres long which are the owners' responsibility.

One of the main causes of prolonged loss of power during and after a storm is the damage to privately owned lines. In an extreme event Counties Power will repair its distribution network first to get power back on for the maximum number of people in the shortest possible time.

Privately owned lines are the last to be repaired and remember that a large number of small faults take a lot longer to repair than a few big ones.

Protect Your Power Supply

Counties Power recommends that you know the customer service line that you own and are responsible for.

Old and poorly maintained lines and those close to trees are the ones most likely to be damaged when the weather turns rough. Damaged Service Lines not only cause power loss to your home they can cause serious injury to people or stock.

So we suggest that you take the precaution of having your line checked before the next storm rolls in - it might just be the one.

You can use any suitably qualified person to check it or you can call Counties Power and we will check it for you. Whichever you choose there will be a charge for checking and for any additional work required.

Or you can start by carrying out your own check. We have listed the things to look for in the side bar.