Ah, it’s not just IDT Energy that is making people insane and/or possibly scamming them. No, companies are giving people gas, so to speak, as well. Per an email on the Carroll Garden Neighborhood Association list with the subject line “Making Me Crazy!” we have this:

I have received in person and now, phone solicitations from VERY persistent telemarketers at “Energy Services Company”. At first, due to language difficulties, I understood the callers to be from KeySpan. I have been badgered, cajoled and infuriated at their repeated requests to call me back in 15 min, 1 hour, 2 hours while I go get my bill so they can offer me an energy savings. I called NatGrid and the rep confirmed that the calls,etc. are coming from their competitor, Energy Services Company. Any suggestions on how to stop them from calling? I know they’ve already been “exposed” on cable TV, but I haven’t seen anything in the dailies. Ideas?

So, it’s the gas companies too. What puzzles us, given the number of stories that “mainstream” media enjoy, uh, picking up from news and neighborhood blogs, why no one has touched these stories. This is one we’d enjoy having stolen expanded upon by the dailies or even the Brooklyn print weeklies. In the meantime, until some lazy reporter enterprising print journalist decides to appropriate this story and make it his/her own do some serious original investigative reporting, check out this flier from Concerned Citizens of Greenwood Heights on how to avoid getting scammed. Also, paging: Betsy Gotbaum, Bill de Blasio, David Yassky, Tish James, Daniel Squadron, Joan Millman, Marty Connor, etc. If ever there were a situation that called for some pro-active political maneuvering, if not legislating, this is it. Your constituents–many of them elderly and relatively defenseless against these sharks–are being scammed. Help them, please.