So far our office has 400+ complaints about price gouging after the ice storm, mainly in southwest Missouri. Attorney General Nixon announced a round of legal actions on Thursday.

We get a lot of questions about the definition of price gouging. In Missouri, price gouging happens when the price of necessary goods and services dramatically jumps during a time of disaster. That happened all over southwest Missouri after last month's storm. We saw abuses in the price of hotel rooms, gasoline, kerosene, generators, even extension cords. We take consumer complaints, then confront the businesses to get their response. The businesses generally fall into categories:

• Eager to work with us and refund money to consumers.
• Willing to give us documents but not willing to refund money. We go to court and ask a judge to order them to pay refunds.
• Not even willing to give us documents. We've taken a Joplin hotel to court for such a refusal - not sure what they are hiding, but the documents are critical, because they show receipts and other evidence of pricing strategy. Also, it's hard for the business to argue when we use their own evidence against them.

Most businesses fall into category 1, realizing it's the right thing to do and it's good for business to have happy customers. Others, unfortunately, fall into categories 2 and 3. Stay tuned for results on those, as well as 40 other businesses we are still investigating for similar complaints. The A.G. expects to have those wrapped up by mid-March.