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HB 4977

Public utilities: consumer services; disclosure on electric utility bills of the number of power outages that occurred within that billing cycle; require. Amends 1939 PA 3 (MCL 460.1 - 460.11) by adding sec. 9e.

2025-2026 Regular Session Introduced by Erin Byrnes and 19 co-sponsors

Michigan utilities must report monthly power outage counts on customer bills to increase transparency about service reliability and infrastructure performance.

bill electronically reproduced 09/17/2025
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Bill Summary · HB 4977

Legislative bill overview

HB 4977 requires Michigan electric utility companies to disclose the number of power outages occurring during each billing cycle directly on customer bills. The bill amends the Michigan Public Utilities Act to establish this new transparency requirement without specifying penalties or enforcement mechanisms at this stage.

Why is this important

Power outage frequency is a direct measure of utility reliability and service quality, but customers currently have no standardized way to track this information on their bills. Requiring this disclosure could help customers identify reliability patterns, support advocacy for infrastructure improvements, and enable data-driven comparisons between utilities' performance over time.

Potential points of contention

  • Definition and measurement ambiguity: The bill doesn't specify how outages should be counted (e.g., do brief interruptions count? partial outages affecting only some customers?), which could lead to inconsistent reporting across utilities
  • Cost burden on utilities: Implementing new billing system modifications and outage tracking requirements may increase operational costs that could be passed to consumers
  • Limited actionability: Simply disclosing outage numbers without context about causes, duration, or affected areas may confuse consumers without necessarily driving meaningful improvements or accountability

Compiled from official sources — confirm details with the bill’s official record.

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