SPOKANE, Wash. — The Washington Utilities and Transportation Commission has directed Spokane-based Avista Corporation to refund $8.4 million to electric and natural gas customers in Washington state.
This comes after the state Court of Appeals ruled in September 2019 that Avista overcharged customers by a total of $43 million.
The state UTC recommended in September that Avista refund $36 million to electric customers and $7 million to natural gas customers after a Court of Appeals order to review the company’s 2015 general rate case.
According to the UTC, the 2015 rate case was contested in Thurston County Superior Court and later given to the Court of Appeals. The court reversed portions of the commission’s order related to estimates of the company’s future plant costs.
The case was remanded back to the commission for further review in the spring of 2019 and was reopened in May 2019, according the UTC.
The UTC said on Friday that electric customers will see refunds of $4,919,000 and natural gas customers will receive $3,571,000 in refunds. The exact amount that customers will see on their bills and the method of distribution will be determined in Avista’s ongoing 2019 general rate case.
The commission must issue an order in the 2019 rate case by March 31.
The Court of Appeals directed the commission to reevaluate the company’s rates without including adjustments for major investments that would not have been operational and beneficial to customers before the rates went into effect. The refunds are a result of removing those future-looking investments from the rate calculation.
Avista serves more than 240,000 electric and nearly 153,000 natural gas customers in eastern Washington.
