We were Suburban Propane (Fargo, ND) customers in 2001 and were happy with their propane service. Approximately in 2004 they were purchased by Ferrellgas. Although we live in Minnesota the Grand Forks, North Dakota office of Ferrellgas was the supplier and answered our calls for customer service. We had a "keep full" contract for propane and also had "locked in" the propane price. The truck would fill our tank in the coldest month and charge us market rates instead of honoring our contract. When my husband would call and ask what happened to our contract, the lady in customer service was always rude to him and then would look up our account and tell him, oh yes she remembered it was a contract and would recalculate the bill. This happened with every bill we received. Finally my husband had enough when they started adding fees for "tank rental" besides all the other fees already in the bill. He contacted a local propane company and with their help purchased a propane tank and they came and fixed it so we could continue to use the propane in the Ferrellgas tank that we had already paid for.
There is alot more to this than I have time to write. I am in the process of filing a complaint with the attorney general. Funny thing, when we disputed our last bill ( of course it was the wrong amount again) they told us we didn't have a contract and we had to pay the market price. We left a balance due and wrote 3 or 4 letters disputing it. Finally, the headquarters office of customer service called and said they would have the "local" office contact us. The same rude lady that my husband has been dealing with for 4 years called and was telling me that my husband was rude and would never let her talk. And she is not in charge of sending out contracts to customers and she has no idea that we wrote letters to Ferrellgas. She put her supervisor on the phone and to "keep" us as customers he would offer us a contract for propane at $1.99 for the whole year. Yet he would not adjust our past due bill under $2.27. So if you threaten to leave the company they offer you a contract and a great rate but if you are a customer you get overcharged and they never send you a contract. The new propane supplier tells us he has alot of ex-Ferrellgas customers and they all basically say the same thing happened to them.