Case No. RB272-00104

April 2, 1997

DECISION AND ORDER

OF THE DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY

Supplemental Order

Name of Case: Crude Oil Supplemental Refund Distribution

Date of Filing:February 27, 1997

Case Number: RB272-00104

Since 1987, the Office of Hearings and Appeals (OHA) has conducted the crude oil overcharge refund proceeding. In this proceeding, we have granted refunds from crude oil overcharge funds under the jurisdiction of the Department of Energy. The proceeding is explained in Statement of Modified Restitutionary Policy, 51 Fed. Reg. 27899 (August 4, 1986), and the regulations governing it are codified at 10 C.F.R. Part 205, Subpart V.

In crude oil refund cases, an applicant can receive a refund equal to the number of gallons of eligible refined petroleum products it purchased during the crude oil price control period, multiplied by a volumetric factor.(1) The size of the volumetric factor depends on the amount of crude oil overcharge funds that the DOE has collected. Initially, we set the volumetric factor at $.0002 per gallon. In April 1989, we raised the volumetric factor to $.0008 per gallon. Any applicant who had received a refund at $.0002 per gallon has also received a supplemental refund of an additional $0.0006 per gallon, so that the total volumetric factor until now for all applicants in this Decision and Order was $.0008. Crude Oil Supplemental Refund Distribution, 18 DOE ¶ 85,878 (1989).

Additional crude oil overcharge funds are now available for disbursement, so we can now issue supplemental refund checks. Applicants who previously received a refund at the volumetric factor of $.0008 will receive a supplemental refund for an additional $0.0008 per gallon.(2) Thus, the amount of the supplemental refund will be equal to the refund already received.

As with all our refunds, the supplemental refunds are rounded to the nearest dollar.

We require applicants for supplemental refunds to verify (directly or through their representatives) their name and address contained in our records, to correct any information that is not accurate, and to indicate whether there has been any change in circumstances affecting the payment of the refund. We will issue a series of Decision and Orders approving supplemental refunds as we receive completed verification forms from applicants or certifications from representatives.

The Appendix to this Decision and Order contains the names and addresses of a group of recipients receiving these supplemental refund checks. The Appendix also indicates the original case numbers of these applicants and the dollar amount of the supplemental refund for each applicant. Each applicant in this group was represented in the crude oil refund proceeding by the firm of Federal Action, Inc. Federal Action submitted forms for each of the applicants verifying addresses and ownership information. In previous Decisions, we have sent supplemental refunds for Federal Action's applicants directly to Federal Action. However, we have become aware that Federal Action has not been sending the refunds to the applicants in a timely manner. Therefore, we will send the supplemental refunds granted in this Decision directly to the applicants. We contacted each applicant by telephone to verify the addresses submitted by Federal Action. The total amount of additional refunds being approved in this Order for the benefit of 17 recipients is $11,445.

It Is Therefore Ordered That:

(1) The Director of Special Accounts and Payroll, Office of Departmental Accounting and Financial Systems Development, Office of the Controller of the Department of Energy shall take appropriate action to disburse an amount equal to the total of the supplemental refunds for the applicants set forth in the Appendix to this Decision and Order.

(2) The funds shall be disbursed from the escrow fund denominated Crude Tracking-Claimants IV, Account No. 999DOE010Z, maintained at the Department of the Treasury.

(3) To facilitate the payment of future refunds, an applicant shall notify the Office of Hearings and Appeals in the event that there is a change of address, or if an address correction is necessary. Such notification shall be sent to :

Director of Management Information

Office of Hearings and Appeals

Department of Energy

Washington, D.C. 20585-0107

(4) Any conditions imposed upon an applicant's receipt of the initial crude oil refund shall also apply to that applicant's receipt of this supplemental refund.

(5) This is a final Order of the Department of Energy.

George B. Breznay

Director

Office of Hearings and Appeals

Date: April 2, 1997

(1)The crude oil price control period extended from August 19, 1973 through January 27, 1981.

(2)We are now paying first-time crude oil refund recipients at the volumetric rate of $0.0016 per gallon.