888-335-7976

This number is for Xcel Energy.  I am on a payment plan and they were calling with a courtesy call to remind me my payment is due in the next few days.

When this showed on my caller id I checked with Xcel and it was a reminder call about my payment arrangement.

888-335-7976 called me too. Said it was excel energy and they needed to talk to me and to call back by 9 pm. If they call back I'm gonna tell em to go f**** themselves and I suggest you all do the same.

Got a call from this number- haven't had an account in my name or with my cell phone number with Xcel for over 4 years now.  My name is not on our current account nor is my phone number- it's all my husbands information.

This is Xcel, or by a minimum, an affiliation of theirs. I received a call w/o a voicemail and Googled the number... hence arriving here at this forum. Once I saw Xcel, it made sense as I am unfortunately tardy on my account. Oftentimes, companies do not do collection calls themselves as it is time-consuming and is not their area of expertise. 3rd party collectors are skilled at what they do; they know what to say and have the time and resources to keep calling. As one of the previous posters stated, they earn a fee on what they get payments on, hence a healthy incentive. Obviously, they collect a fee on any payments they arrange/make, so it is quite obvious that if they ever called you... that they would probably call again to see if a payment needed to be made, regardless if that was the case or not. THEY ARE MAKING MONEY either way... if it is a past due or current account.

Also, I would just like to say for the record that MANY companies out there have an excessive number of contact numbers... not always just one magic number that gets you wherever you want to go in a company. I work for a telecom company and we and have seen other businesses (CenturyLink for example) that have many numbers for this that and the other based on purpose and location of the office. It is NOT at all surprising that a customer service rep at a company wouldn't know ALL the toll free (and non-toll free for that matter) numbers that their company is in control of.

I suggest that if you get a call that you question, answer it and address it. If they are an affiliate that gained your number via a list of some sort, I am unsure if they can totally remove it as they have an ongoing agreement with Xcel, whom Xcel uses at any point in time to collect monies on your account. They may not have a legit reason to call today, but could in 2 months if you would by chance miss a payment. It is not a conspiracy. We as a society are more sensitive as whole than ever before (with good reason) and find ourselves questioning a lot of things, but I could thing of an infinite numbe of other things worth more time than this.

I just got a call feom here, they left a message for me by name, and asked for me to call back by 9pm tonight. Said it was a notice for service interruption. They wanted me to call the 888 number. Which I found odd, and then going by what others have said above.. I don't know why they wouldn't ask you to call billing directly.. I had paid the bill yesterday, guessing it just wasn't taken off the list.

This is a SCAM. Whoever is running it is putting in a lot of time to make all these posts about how its legit, but considering multiple people have already said that Xcel themselves claim no knowledge of this not to mention the shady nature of it, its obviously NOT. I've been receiving the same call for the last year or two but it's under someone else's name. Funny thing is it's a google voice number i've had since google voice was in private beta, so, a long time. I've never given it out to anyone and there is no way a legitimate company would call someone 2+ years in a row, especially on a completely inconsistent and seemingly random basis. Sometimes I get 1 call a month and some I get none. I haven't gotten any for about 6 months and suddenly I get one today? Way too fishy if you ask me.

I get a phone call about once every 2 months from this number. I live IL and no Xcel around here. They leave an automated message saying it is XCel Energy calling for Kevin M. I used to feel kinda bad for him considering they were going to shut off his electric and didn't have the right number for the poor guy. Haha!

Whoever is using this phone # is letting my phone ring over 30 times, three calls, in a row.  They've done it on Monday and every day, since then. They're harassing me!!!!!!!!!!

It was Northern States Power Company not Car Company. They are now Xcel Energy and supply power to Minnesota and other states.

Got automated call from this number.  I waited and spoke to an agent.  They asked for Phone #, Address and last 4 digits of SSN.  They knew my account balance. It was a week past due. They wanted to know if I wanted to make a payment, I declined and said I would mail the payment, as I was suspicious.

I called XCel energy (the number on my monthly statement) and they confirmed that the call was from them and they had a record of the notes the 1st agent had taken.  I went ahead and made the payment.

Not a scam.  Ignore whoever says it is.

got several of these today. they called my voip number, not the number on the account.  as it happens I block all 8xx numbers so they never got through.  since the voip number is new, and they did not call the number on the account, I suspect either a cold-call sales attempt or some sort of phishing.

oh... and my account has zero balance

This IS Excel Energy. I have had accounts with them for over 20 years and this is always the number that calls if you're late. Although I HATE them too, at least they do give you a warning call before they disconnect your service......we all go through times that we have issues paying on time, but to say they are a scam or call someone a phisher is wrong when you are obviously not aware of what you are talking about.

They state they are collecting on an Excel Energy bill and threaten disconnect.  Our bill is not due for another week.  They say they are Excel Energy.

This number called my home today...they said they were from Xcel Energy and wanted to collect a payment. I called Xcel myself and also looked at my account on line. I didnt owe anything except the upcoming monthly bill. This is definitely a scam. They ask for a check by phone, or debit card/credit card over the phone. DONT GIVE IT OUT!!!!

I just got a call from this number on my cell phone this afternoon, and the only message that was left was a man saying "Brian." As if he was setting his name on a greeting. Weird.

I used to work for Xcel and Northern States Power was the local company name in Wisconsin and Minnesota.  When multiple electric companies joined together they had to take a separate name from any of the individual groups.  So NSP is sometimes still called that by reps here, however they should be using the proper company name of Xcel energy when they reply.

Xcel isn't a scam, they were calling you because your payment was late.  They are doing in much quicker now so that they can resolve them before the bill is suddenly so overwhelming that people end up disconnected before they know it.  So when I answered today she was very polite and said it was a courtesy call, and she was very  polite.

It's a scam, it is not Xcel.