Stuck? Call (555) 555-0124. Somebody answers, day or night. That's not an answering service and it's not a pager. It's me or my dispatcher, awake, with a radio, and a truck rolling to you in most cases within 30 to 45 minutes anywhere in the county. We've been doing this for 15 years and we've never closed, not for Christmas, not for the blizzard of '94, not for anything.

I'm Al, but everybody calls me Ace, and so does the side of the truck. I started Ace Towing in 1984 with one wrecker and a borrowed radio. Today we run wreckers, a flatbed rollback and a heavy-duty truck for the big stuff, and we do it straight: the rates on this page are the rates. No surprises on the bill, no hidden storage fees, no games.

• Light-duty towing. Cars, pickups, vans, minivans. Wheel-lift wreckers so we don't touch your bumper.
• Flatbed rollback. The safest way to move anything with four-wheel drive, a low front end, or a body you care about. The whole car rides on the bed.
• Heavy-duty. Delivery trucks, RVs, small buses, farm equipment. Call for a quote.
• Accident recovery. We work with the county sheriff and the city police on rotation. If you've been in a wreck, we'll get your car off the road, to the lot, and to the body shop of your choice, and we'll help you get your stuff out of it.
• Roadside service. Jumps, lockouts, tires, fuel, as above.
• Junk car removal. If it's whole and has a title, we'll usually haul it away free and pay you scrap price. Call for details.
• Private property towing for apartment complexes and businesses, by written agreement, signs posted, everything by the book.

I've pulled a lot of people off the side of the road in 15 years and the ones who were fine were the ones who did these things. Print this and stick it in the glove box.

1. Get off the road. The second you feel something wrong (a thump, steam, the engine cutting out), put your signal on and get to the shoulder or the next exit. Don't try to make it to the next town. A car on the shoulder is an inconvenience. A car dead in a lane is a wreck waiting to happen.
2. Hazard flashers on. Immediately. Day or night.
3. On the highway, stay in the car. Seat belt on. Doors locked. People get killed every year standing next to a broken-down car on the interstate, and almost nobody gets hurt sitting inside it. If you must get out (smoke, fire), get out the passenger side and get well off the road, away from the car, behind the guardrail if there is one.
4. On a quiet road, it's okay to get out and raise the hood, which is the universal signal for "I need help." Tie a white rag or a bag to the antenna or the door handle.
5. Call us. Tell dispatch: what road, which direction you're headed, the nearest exit or mile marker or cross street, what kind of car, and what color. "I'm on the highway by the big tree" doesn't help. If you don't have a car phone, wait for a police officer or a passing motorist to call for you; most people will stop and most officers patrol the highway regularly.
6. Don't accept a tow from a truck you didn't call. There are outfits that cruise the highway listening to scanners. If a truck pulls up and you didn't call them and the police didn't send them, you're allowed to say no thanks. Ask for the name of the company and the price before anybody hooks up to anything.
7. Know where you want it to go. Have the name of your mechanic in mind. If you don't have one, we'll take it to our lot for the night and you can decide tomorrow. Nobody makes a good decision at 2 a.m. on the shoulder.
8. Get your stuff out before the truck leaves: purse, keys, garage door opener, the kids' car seat, anything in the trunk you'll need. It's a pain to go back for it.

Winter is our busy season. On the first cold snap of the year we'll do 60 jump starts in a day, and almost all of them are batteries that were already weak in October. A little prevention now:

• Battery. If yours is more than four years old, have it tested before Thanksgiving. Any parts store will do it free. Cold cuts a battery's power roughly in half, and a battery that starts you fine in September will leave you sitting in January.
• Antifreeze. Have the coolant checked. It should protect to at least 30 below in our part of the country.
• Tires. Tread and pressure. Tire pressure drops as it gets cold; check it monthly. Bald tires and ice are how people end up in ditches, and I've got the winch-out numbers to prove it.
• Keep the tank at least half full. Less chance of the fuel line freezing and more time to run the heater if you're stuck.
• Wipers and washer fluid. Winter blades and a jug of the good de-icing fluid. Salt spray on the windshield with no fluid is a real bad time.
• The trunk kit: blanket, flashlight with fresh batteries, jumper cables, a small shovel, a bag of sand or cat litter for traction, a scraper, an old pair of gloves and boots, a couple of candy bars, and a white rag for the antenna.
• If you slide off into a snowbank: stay with the car. Run the engine 10 minutes an hour for heat, and make sure the tailpipe is clear of snow first, every time, or the exhaust comes inside. Crack a window. Turn on the dome light at night so we can find you.
• Don't spin the tires trying to get out of the ditch. You'll dig in deeper, and you can burn up a transmission. Rock it gently, forward and back, a few times. If it doesn't come out in five minutes, it's not coming out. Call.

I got the name Ace in the Army, for reasons I'm not putting on the Internet, and it stuck. I bought my first wrecker, a used 1978 Ford with a Holmes boom, in the spring of 1984, and I ran it alone for three years, sleeping with the radio on the nightstand. My wife dispatched from the kitchen. We got our first flatbed in 1990, the heavy-duty truck in 1996, and the shop with the fenced lot on the east side of town in 1993.

Fifteen years later it's a real company with real trucks, but I still drive. Every one of my drivers is trained, licensed, insured and sober, and they're the kind of people I'd want showing up for my own daughter at 2 in the morning, because that's the test. We're bonded and fully insured, and we belong to the state towing association.

What I'm proudest of: in fifteen years we've never had a customer's car damaged on our hook that we didn't make right, and we've never left anybody on the side of the road because they couldn't pay that night. You call, we come. We'll sort out the rest.