QUESTION: Whatever happened to the $50 American Express gift cards Hawaiian Electric Co. was sending out to thousands of customers who lost power when a winter storm ripped through Oahu in March 2011 and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 1260 went out on strike?

ANSWER: Of the more than 8,000 customers who lost electricity for several days — primarily those on the Ewa Plain — “a few thousand” were promised to receive gift cards and letters from HECO to apologize for the service loss, a company spokesman said in March.

“They all went out relatively soon after that (promise was made),” Peter Rosegg, HECO spokesman, said Friday.

HECO was not planning on sending the cards to every customer who lost power, Darren Pai, a HECO spokesman, said in a March statement. Instead, the cards went out to people based on how long they were without electricity, Pai said.

If customers did not receive a gift card after the incident, Rosegg said they can still contact HECO to determine whether one is deserved.

Rosegg said if customers are entitled to the cards, HECO will make sure they received them.

He also said customers who thought they were entitled to a card but did not receive one should call HECO to verify that the contact information the company has on file for them is up-to-date and the card wasn’t sent to the wrong address.

The March outages were storm-related, but Mother Nature’s fury was compounded when 54 percent of the company’s employees, members of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 1260, went on strike on the same day. An agreement between the union and company management was reached the following Monday, on March 7, 2011.

“Some of our customers experienced especially long outages under unique and unusual circumstances during the period starting Friday, March 4,” Pai said in a March statement. “We recognize how difficult this was for our customers. We told them we know the gift cards do not make up for the disruption, but they are a small thank you for their patience and understanding.”

HECO’s customer service number is 548-7311, or you can call 543-4624 to speak with a representative from the Claims Department.

Information regarding how to file a claim for compensation related to service loss can be found at www.heco.com: click on “Residential Services,” then the “Power Interruptions” link on the left, and scroll down.

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This update was written by Sarah Zoellick. Suggest a topic for “Whatever Happened To …” by writing Honolulu Star-Advertiser, 500 Ala Moana Blvd., Suite 7-210, Honolulu 96813; call 529-4747; or email cityeditors@staradvertiser.com.