Murfreesboro Electric Company Penalized for other's mistakes. Permanent deposit. Kiss your deposit goodbye. Murfreesboro, Tennessee

I moved here last year to buy my first house, finally, after going through various wild goose chases in the over-priced Florida housing market.

Everything went smoothly enough, until I signed up for electric service for my new little place, and they required a $300 deposit to activate service. This is a lot of money for me, after starving my way through the Florida job market for the previous three years. They really didn't care, and said as much. They also said it was because so many people had been stiffing the company on their electric bills previously. Well, that's not my fault. I have perfect credit. So much for paying your bills on time-you still get screwed. They said the money would be returned after a solid year of paying the bill.

I signed up last September, so I recently called, and asked for my money back. The lady said, in a rude manner, "our records show you were a few days late in April, so we can't give it back". She said that I could ask again in April. WTF!