Sierra Pacific Power Company
Contact: Gary Aldax
Phone: (775) 834-5508

For Immediate Release

Increased telephone and Internet options for Sierra Pacific Power Company customers have led to decreased walk-in volume in many of the company's district offices. As a result, Sierra Pacific will be discontinuing the business office functions in the company's Hawthorne office, effective April 26 and Tonopah office, effective April 27.

Although walk-in service will no longer be available at these offices, customers will still be able to start, stop, transfer service, make payment arrangements and discuss billing issues by telephone. To report an outage or for customer service, Hawthorne customers should call (800)962- 0402; Tonopah customers should call (800)962-0396. Field operations personnel will continue to be based in these communities for system maintenance and outage response.

"Our customers have more options than ever before to conduct routine business office transactions,"said Gretchen Djukanovich, manager of customer contact."We are continually looking for ways to maximize efficiencies and develop more cost-effective ways of serving our customers."

Payments can still be made by U.S. Mail; online through the company's website; by automatic withdrawal from the customer's bank account; and locally at Shop& Pay locations in each community. More information about these payment options is available on the company's website at www.sierrapacific.com.

Customers will receive notices in their Sierra Pacific bills regarding this change.