Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel is calling on DTE Energy and Consumers Energy to credit those who lost power for several days due to severe storms last week.
Both companies do offer credits if people lost power for five days or more.
According to a release from the AG's office, Nessel wants Consumers and DTE to voluntarily credit customers affected by the outages and provide greater credits to those who have lost hundreds of dollars in food or other housing costs.
Nessel also wants both companies to create a fund to help displaced customers during significant power outages.
"The utility workers for Consumers Energy and DTE Energy are working hard to restore power, and I appreciate those who have worked tirelessly the last several days on behalf of the communities they serve, but these companies also need to work hard to restore trust with their customers," Nessel said in a release. "One way to restore confidence is to voluntarily adopt automatic outage credits and create a fund to assist customers displaced because of these increasingly frequent and powerful storms. We know that climate change is having a significant real impact, and a business-as-usual approach is no longer sufficient. That is why it's imperative that our utility companies adapt to the changing climate and needs of their thousands of customers. Consumers Energy and DTE must do better than this."
Currently, to obtain an outage credit, a customer needs to file with their utility.
