Keeping our employees and our communities safe
Xcel Energy electric and natural gas crews and tree trimming crews are still working in the field to ensure safe, reliable service. These workers have taken steps to ensure their health and safety while reducing everyone’s potential exposure to illness.
Here’s what you can expect if you see Xcel Energy crews working in the field and how you can help:
- When interacting with customers and the public, our crews will practice social distancing to help keep all of us safe and healthy.
- We ask that you do not approach our workers. This helps maintain social distance to keep everyone safe and lets our workers concentrate on their critical jobs.
- We have suspended non-essential work that requires crews to enter homes or businesses. But in some emergency cases, such as to relight appliance pilot lights if natural gas service is disrupted, a worker may need to enter your home or business.
What to expect if an Xcel Energy employee needs to enter your home or business:
- First, know that any Xcel Energy worker who comes to your home is taking precautions, as recommended by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the World Health Organization, to prevent the spread of COVID-19.
- When the worker arrives, they will ask if anyone in your home is sick and ask them to remain in a separate part of the house while our work is being completed.
- To ensure everyone’s health and safety, employees will not shake hands and will maintain a social distance of at least six feet.
- Our worker may wear personal protective gear, such as gloves, safety glasses or coveralls. They may also use disinfecting wipes and hand sanitizer.
Another way we are helping to ensure the safety of our employees and customers is by suspending manual meter reading for most customers. While many electric and gas meters are read automatically, some require an in-person reading. A customer with one of these meters will receive an estimated bill based on previous usage. When manual meter reading resumes, bills will reflect the actual energy used.
We are in regular communication with all our emergency operations centers and federal and state agencies to stay up to date and in coordination with them. We are also working closely with our communities to support any additional needs they may have in setting up remote hospitals or needing additional power.