Disabled and disgruntled

I was without power for 5 days and received NO notification of the planned outage. A text message, like the ones sent after the outage was in its 3rd hour, would have been ideal in order to prepare. I was also working on my Master finals and had no power to Starlink.

I have a small generator that thankfully pulled enough to keep water, food, and heat on. However, it is a pull start and my fused hands to wrist could NOT get it started. After 4.5 hrs someone arrived to pull start the generator for me. Day 3 it started sputtering and I was told by Generac the portable is not designed to run that long.

Houses burned down because of generator use. Since Xcel has given themselves a 4% bonus increase and we are now paying 6% more for, perhaps the ethical business practice ought to have put the entire 6% towards updating and renovating infrastructure so "preventative" shutdowns are not necessary.

Further, your deal with the Colorado and BlackRock to eliminate fossil fuel creating a monopoly, creates quite the predicament for gas operated generators as back-ups because you fail at the job we pay for. Your 4% bonus ought to be redistributed as rebates for a generator contract for residential back up power...because you fail to install equipment modeled after other states with high wind fortitude infrastructure models or renovate to underground cables. You expect consumers to always accept increases for services you cannot reliably provide because you are too busy paying politicians, yourselves, and privately owned corrupt deal making.

With Excels priorities NOT being about providing safe reliable service, overloading antiquated equipment, misusing funds, this is really an insult to consumers to even ask for input and our experiences.

Bottom line, I was 5 days without power, over used my gas powered generator to point of shut-down, and nothing is going to change on your end. I didn't receive a refund on my homeowners insurance for the 5 days of preventative power outage either and I am still paying increased power bills with no reliable back up for your reduced liability and lack of responsibility.