Utility door hangers and vegetation notices: what the paper records

A door hanger is one way an inspector discharges a duty to attempt contact and log it. Step 6.1 of PG&E Utility Procedure TD-7102P-01, Revision 4, requires a direct attempt, a description of the work, and a record of the method, name, date and outcome. Revision 2 named the door hanger. Revision 4 names no method at all.

A mark on a trunk carries the prescription. The notice on the door carries the date, the program and the phone number. Each holds what the other leaves out, and both come from the same procedure.

This is about the second artifact. What the notice is obliged to be, what the inspector is obliged to do instead of leaving one, and what the visit puts in the file whether or not paper ever reaches your handle.

What the procedure requires is an attempt, not a notice

The obligation in force on PG&E's distribution system sits in step 6.1 of Utility Procedure TD-7102P-01, Revision 4, effective November 15, 2025:

The VMI must ATTEMPT to contact the customer/property owner directly AND DESCRIBE the work to be performed. a. DOCUMENT in the system of record all contact attempts AND INCLUDE at least the following details: - Method of contact - Name of customer/property owner who was contacted - Date/time that contact occurred - Outcome of the contact attempt

The duty runs to the attempt and to the record of it. The step names a documented attempt and stops there.

That is where it bites. A hanger on your handle shows that an inspector discharged step 6.1 by one of the available means. An empty handle sends you to the record instead, and the record sits on the utility's side of the fence.

Step 6.1 continues: where the first attempt draws no response, the inspector attempts contact up to two more times and enters the details and method of those attempts into the system of record. Three logged attempts are a complete performance of the step. What that record becomes once it reaches the crew is the same four fields, traveling with the work order.

The door hanger used to be named, and now is not

Revision 2 of the same procedure, published April 20, 2023 and effective June 20, 2023, wrote the same duty with a list attached to it:

ATTEMPT to contact the customer/property owner directly and DESCRIBE the work to be performed. - Acceptable methods of contact include: - Direct contact in person - Phone Calls - Email - Door hanger - Letters

Revision 4 dropped the list. Its revision notes record the change in one line, "Section 6 Updated information about making notifications," and the five bullets are gone from the step.

	Revision 2, effective June 20, 2023	Revision 4, effective November 15, 2025
Step number	6.2	6.1
Methods named	Five, including door hanger	None
Further attempts	At least two more, for a total of three	Up to two more
When attempts are logged	If the owner withholds acknowledgment	Every attempt, always
Fields required in the record	Details and method	Method, name, date and time, outcome
Trigger for the next procedure	Owner refuses to allow the work	Owner interferes with the work

Both revisions are readable, and they sit in different places. The copy PG&E publishes on its own website is still Revision 2. Revision 4 reached the public through the company's 2026 to 2028 base Wildfire Mitigation Plan filing at the Office of Energy Infrastructure Safety. The guide to marks on the trunk covers the same split across the appendices, which is worth knowing before quoting a step number at anybody.

Answering the door now creates a record too

Revision 2 made the logging conditional. The details and method went into the system of record if the customer or property owner did not acknowledge receipt of the information. A conversation at the gate that ended in a nod satisfied the step and stayed out of the file.

Revision 4 removed the condition. Every contact attempt is documented, and the four fields quoted above are the floor. One of them is your name, and another is the outcome, which means a successful conversation now leaves as much behind as a missed one.

That matters at the far end rather than on the day. A prescription written this fall reaches a crew months later, and the question that eventually gets asked is whether the owner was told. Under Revision 2 the file could be silent because the answer was yes. Under Revision 4 the file answers either way.

The one notice that asks for a signature

Second patrol work runs under a separate document. Utility Procedure TD-7102P-23, Revision 2, the Vegetation Management Second Patrol Procedure, was published July 31, 2019 and runs to 18 pages. Its section 8 is headed "Communicating with the Customer," and it is the only one of these procedures that asks the owner to sign anything:

1. ATTEMPT to CONTACT the customer. 2. IF successful, THEN perform the following tasks: a. EXPLAIN the scope of work being prescribed, including the scope of clean up and the amount of debris likely to be left behind. b. When possible, OBTAIN a signed Notification of Tree Work (NTW) Form from the property owner for heavy trimming and removal work.

The step puts the description first and the signature second. What the inspector is directed to describe is the work, the cleanup and the debris, which is the same ground as what is left lying on your land when the crew goes. Ask which scope was described before signing, because the form attaches to that description.

The form travels past the truck. Section 13.1 requires the project folders filed in the local office to hold the index and field maps highlighted and signed by the CUF and SCUF, the original signed NTWs where applicable, and additional permits. Your signature ends up in a circuit folder, filed by project, and section 12.2 lists the NTW first among the project documents collected at the end of each job.

The same section sets the only clock in any of these procedures. Where the pre-inspector fails to reach the customer after three documented attempts within five business days, they follow Attachment 1, the Customer Notification Process, and provide photographs for the Customer Impact process. Five business days is the window in which calling back is still part of the conversation rather than a separate case.

Two PG&E documents that say nothing about notifying you

The notification duty lives in one procedure. It is absent from the program standard above that procedure, and absent from the EVM procedure beside it.

Utility Standard TD-7102S, Revision 2, the Distribution Vegetation Management Program, sets requirements for the whole distribution program. It has eight numbered sections:

• Regulatory Requirements

• PG&E Requirements and Expectations

• Roles and Responsibilities

• Industry Standards and Arboriculture Practices

• Utility Arboriculture Cycles

• Annual Planning

• Records Management and Data Integrity

• Exceptions

All eight are addressed to the system and the program. The phrase property owner appears once in the whole standard, in the definition of a Constraint, as a situation that occurs when a customer, property owner, or agency obstructs or delays the work.

Utility Procedure TD-7106P-01, Revision 0, the Enhanced Vegetation Management Pre-Inspection Procedure published May 12, 2020, has six numbered sections. Five of them are about the inspection itself: general expectations, overhanging vegetation, primary conductor radial clearance, trees with strike potential, and LIDAR based vegetation points. The sixth is headed "Customer Refusal," and it is one sentence long, pointing to TD-7102P-04. An EVM pre-inspection under that procedure runs from measuring a tree straight to handling a refusal.

Refusal became interference between two revisions

The procedure that opens after you respond changed name and trigger between Revision 2 and Revision 4.

Revision 2, step 6.3:

IF the customer/property owner refuses to allow the work to proceed, THEN the VMI must FOLLOW the steps in the document titled TD-7102P-04, "Distribution Vegetation Refusal Procedure."

Revision 4, step 6.1:

IF the customer/property owner interferes with the work, THEN the VMI must FOLLOW the steps in the TD-7102P-04, "Vegetation Management Distribution Interference" procedure.

The document number held. The word describing what you did, and the word in the title, both moved from refusal to interference.

The definitions moved with them. Revision 2 defined a Constraint as a situation that occurs when a customer, property owner, or agency obstructs or delays the work. Revision 4 gives that word to an environmental concern or a local government or agency, and drops the customer and the property owner out of the sentence. What a refusal does once it is on file, and the two artifacts the Commission's own exception requires before one counts, belong to the guide on refusal and its limits.

California law requires a notice and leaves its contents open

One statute conditions entry on a notice. Public Resources Code section 4295.5 lets a utility traverse land "after providing notice and an opportunity to be heard to the landowner," and the section names no content, no method of delivery and no lead time. What that right reaches and what it leaves standing is its own subject, and the open condition is the part that arrives at the door.

The practical consequence is that the notice you get is the program's own document, written by the utility that printed it, and different programs print different ones. PG&E's routine vegetation management fact sheet, document CCC-1221-4299 dated December 9, 2021, commits to three channels and leaves the timing open:

If any safety work is planned for your property, you can expect to be notified by phone calls, postcards and door hangers.

Down the coast the commitment is written through two channels instead of three. San Diego Gas and Electric tells customers that inspectors and crews needing access give advance notification, ordinarily a telephone call or a notice left at the door. Each company writes its own, because the state left the content to them.

Reading the one you have

A notice is worth reading for four things, and a hanger from a routine cycle will usually carry three of them.

• The program it came from. A routine annual cycle, a second patrol, an EVM pre-inspection and a storm response are separate procedures with separate documents behind them, and the contact point printed on the notice is the fastest way to tell which one you are in.

• The contact point itself. PG&E gives 1-877-295-4949 and wildfiresafety@pge.com on the routine fact sheet, and the number printed on the paper in your hand is the one to call first.

• A date. Write down the date you found it, because the attempts logged against your parcel carry timestamps and your copy should carry one too.

• Whether it asks for anything back. A form to sign is a second patrol artifact and belongs to a described scope. A hanger by itself records that an attempt was made.

Then make the call while the inspection is still recent. The prescription was written at the assessment, and the credential and the vantage point behind that assessment decide what the person on the phone can change. Ask which span and which pole the work sits on, ask what the prescription says for each stem, and ask what the record currently shows about contact with you. That last question has an answer, because under Revision 4 the file holds one however the attempt turned out.

Further reading

• Utility tree markings: what the paint, the ribbon and the tag mean: The mark carries the prescription. The notice carries the date and the name.

• What to expect during a utility line clearance visit: The three trips the notice sits between, and where the right of entry comes from.

• PRC 4295.5: when a utility may traverse land, and what it does not excuse: The one statute that conditions entry on notice, and what it leaves undefined.

Frequently asked questions

Is a utility required to leave me a door hanger before tree work?

No rule names the door hanger. PG&E Utility Procedure TD-7102P-01, Revision 4, requires the inspector to attempt to contact the customer or property owner directly and describe the work, and to record the method, the name, the date and time, and the outcome of every attempt. A hanger is one way to carry that out. Revision 2 of the same procedure listed five acceptable methods and the door hanger was among them. Revision 4 dropped the list.

I signed something the inspector handed me. What was it?

Probably a Notification of Tree Work form. Section 8.1 of PG&E Utility Procedure TD-7102P-23, Revision 2, directs the pre-inspector to explain the scope of work being prescribed, including the scope of clean up and the amount of debris likely to be left behind, and then, when possible, to obtain a signed Notification of Tree Work form for heavy trimming and removal work. Section 13.1 of the same procedure sends the original signed forms to the project folders filed in the local office.

Nobody left anything and the crew still came. Is that allowed?

Under the procedure, yes. Step 6.1 of Revision 4 requires an attempt at contact, not a delivered notice, and requires up to two further attempts if the first draws no response. The attempts and their outcomes go into the system of record either way. PG&E's own Trees and Powerlines page treats notification as a courtesy and states that in some cases you may not get a notice, which is covered in the guide to what a clearance visit actually involves.

Does the notice tell me which of my trees is coming down?

Usually not. The prescription lives in the tree record, written at the inspection, and what you see on the trunk is a summary of it. A dot and an X mean different work, and the marking guide covers what each shape and color records. The notice carries the visit, a program and a contact point. Matching the two is the reason to keep both.

What does the notice not commit the utility to?

A date. PG&E's routine vegetation management fact sheet, document CCC-1221-4299 dated December 9, 2021, says only that customers can expect to be notified by phone calls, postcards and door hangers if safety work is planned. No California regulation sets the content or lead time of that notice, and the statute that conditions entry on notice, Public Resources Code 4295.5, names no form, method or number of days.