My fiance and I moved into a rental home just in the past couple of weeks, we took the lease over from friends due to them moving out and making the house available. We assumed that the electricity was either still on in their name or transferred to the landlord since in was currently on. On July 9th, 2012 a police officer and a representative from TECO show up at my door and state to my fiance that the electricity at this location was on illegally and they would be cutting it off. Although the electrical box was locked up with a standard TECO tag that was obviously place on the box by TECO. Well since we had already emailed TECO about starting service in our name, I went to a local ACE check cashing facility and paid the deposit as required in the return email that we received with the account number for our new account. After paying the deposit I contacted customer service to report to them the receipt number as required. The gentleman that answered the phone took all the information and proceeded to place me on hold, after holding for just over 32 minutes he comes back on the line and gives me a number to contact another division, concerning electricity theft and loss prevention, which I called three times and left three messages and my fiance did the same no one ever picked up the phone or returned a call. I am a father of four the oldest 7 and the youngest 8 months, I explained on the message that I had just purchased over 300.00 dollars in groceries that were in the refridgerator and would go bad if we did not correct the situation. I also went one step further and contacted the lady that just vacated the home and made sure that she also had no account problems with TECO. She informed me that TECO had just started new service at her home on Florida that same day and her account was in good standing. I contacted the owner of the home and he also has an account in good standing, and last but not least I contacted TECO to insure that my fiance had no prior negative history with TECO and she does not. She was just refunded her deposit from TECO that was issued from our previous location. So without having spoken to anyone at TECO in the loss protection department I contacted my attorney Mr. Norman Canella and he got me a phone number to JORGE CERMENO a vice president in that division in Tampa and I left him a message at 7pm. Hopefully I should have contact with someone tomorrow but wanted to inform you that although I understand the importance of controlling theft, it should be just as important to take care of customers that have paid TECO on time and have had no previous problems or the at least have the company contact them in a timely fashion. I will be forwarding the receipts from my grocery store dated and time stamped as well as my receipt for the hotel that I will have to pay this evening and will be expecting TECO to reimburse me those expenses. Thank you for your time and looking forward to speaking with a representative SOON... J. Guzman