Some of the equipment bringing power to your house belongs to the utility, and some belongs to you. Nothing about it looks different from the ground. The consequence of guessing is a wasted day: the utility will not work on your equipment, and an electrician cannot work on theirs.
Where the boundary sits
There is a handover point on the path power takes into your house. On the supply side of it: the pole, the overhead conductors, the drop to your house, and the meter itself. On your side: the attachment point and mast, the weatherhead, the service entrance conductors running down the wall, normally the socket the meter plugs into, and the main panel and everything past it.
The important caveat, and the reason everything above says “normally”: the exact demarcation varies by provider. The meter socket in particular is customer equipment in many territories and utility equipment in others. So treat the diagram as the shape of the arrangement rather than a rule, and confirm the specifics with whoever serves your address — it is a question their support line answers routinely.
What is reliable is the shape. There is a boundary; neither party crosses it; and the symptom usually tells you which side of it you are on.
Which provider covers you
Lawton-area homes are not all served by the same electricity provider — coverage depends on the address rather than the town, and rural parts of Comanche County are served differently from the city. If you have never had reason to check, the provider is on your bill, and that is worth knowing before you need it at ten at night.
Worth having saved: the provider name, their outage reporting number, and your account or meter number. Reporting an outage is much faster when you are not looking for a bill while holding a torch.
Who to call, by symptom
No power at all, and the neighbours are out too
Utility. An outage on the network. Report it and it goes into their system; nothing an electrician does helps, and a call-out fee for confirming an outage is a waste of money.
No power at all, and the neighbours are fine
Usually the utility first. Could be either — a fault on your service drop, or your main breaker or service equipment. Reporting it to the utility costs nothing, and a crew attending will say which side the fault is on. If it is yours, you will need an electrician before they can restore.
Half the house has no power
Either — the pattern narrows it. A lost leg, which can originate on the supply side or at your service equipment. Worth reporting to the utility and getting it looked at, because the split itself does not tell you which side. What the pattern usually means.
The cable has been pulled away from the house
Utility first, then an electrician. Wind or a branch has pulled the drop off. Stay well clear and report it. The utility reattaches their conductors, but if the mast, weatherhead or attachment has been damaged, that is customer equipment and needs repairing before they can finish.
The meter or its enclosure is damaged
Utility first. The meter is theirs. The socket it plugs into is usually yours, which is why this one frequently needs both — and why the order matters, since only the utility can pull the meter to let anyone work on the socket.
A tree or branch is on the overhead line
Utility, always. Never attempt to clear it, and do not let a tree service do it either. Report it. Conductors do not have to be down to be dangerous.
Breakers tripping, flickering, warm outlets, a smell
Electrician. All inside the house, all customer side. Some of these are urgent rather than scheduled. What counts as urgent.
Lights brightening in one part of the house while dimming in another
Report to the utility, and get it looked at. A degrading neutral, which can be on either side of the boundary. It damages equipment while it persists, so this is not one to leave. Treat it as urgent either way. Why this pattern matters.
Voltage seems low, or equipment is behaving oddly across the whole house
Utility first. Whole-house symptoms point upstream. They can measure at the service, which establishes whether what arrives is within tolerance before anyone starts looking inside.
If your service is underground
The same principle with a different geography. The buried conductors from the transformer to your property are typically the utility's; the run from the point of delivery into your meter and panel is typically yours. Because it is buried, neither side is diagnosed by looking, so this is a case where reporting it and letting them measure at the service is genuinely the fastest route.
One practical point that matters more with an underground service: before any digging on your property — a fence, a post, a tree, a patio — have the utilities located first. Hitting a buried service conductor is both dangerous and expensive, and locating is free.
The sequence after a storm
Getting the order right saves the most time here, because the two parties have to work in sequence rather than in parallel.
- Look, from a distance, and report anything visible. Conductors down, a cable pulled off the house, a damaged mast or meter enclosure, a branch on the line.
- Report the outage even if damage is obvious. It is how you enter their queue, and their assessment establishes which side the fault is on.
- If the fault is on your side, get an electrician. The utility cannot restore into damaged customer equipment, so this repair is the thing standing between you and power.
- The utility reconnects. Where the meter has to be pulled for the repair, only they can do that and re-set it, which is why the sequence is not optional.
- Check the house once power is back. Reset what has tripped, and treat anything warm, buzzing or smelling as urgent — storm and outage preparation covers what to check.
What an electrician does on this boundary
Everything from the handover point inward: the mast and weatherhead, the service entrance conductors, the meter socket where that is customer equipment, the main breaker, the panel, and the grounding and bonding that make the whole arrangement safe.
The coordination is part of the job rather than an afterthought. Work on service equipment usually needs the meter pulled and the supply disconnected, which is the utility's to do, so the appointment has to be arranged around theirs. That is normally what sets the schedule on a panel or service upgrade — not the electrical work itself.
And the useful thing an electrician can do before any of that: measure at the service to establish which side a fault is on. If what arrives is within tolerance, the problem is inside and worth tracing. If it is not, that is a report to the utility with a measurement behind it, which gets taken more seriously than a description.