service connection

This would be the utility co., but I have never seen the connections exposed like this. Is this acceptable? Both hots look the same.

ext elect .jpg

No, that’s not acceptable. Something in my gut tells me that’s probably not even a power company applied tap. That puts me more in mind of a temporary tap done by the electrician during an upgrade that never got replaced with a permanent one by the power company. I should add that while this is not acceptable, it’s not especially unusual to find. Best of luck actually getting anyone to fix it. It doesn’t belong to the property owner, even though it’s on their property, and the real owner (the PoCo) doesn’t normally get too excited about fixing these up. There’s not really anything you can do to compel them to patch it up either.

Thanks Marc, you confimed everything I was thinking.

Just thought that I should add that what you’re looking at there is an H-Tap that was probably never crimped. It looks like it was just “closed” with a pair of pliers maybe. That’s what made me think it was just for temp use. There doesn’t appear to be any signs of heating, however, so it must be working out by some miracle.

Marc, you always give quality info. The system won’t let me give you a greenie, sorry.
P.S. reported this today to the power co. as a hazard.