Consumers

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The Ohio Consumers’ Counsel has fileds for a stay on the detail in a rate increas PUCO approved this monthfor Columbus-base d American Electric Power (NYSE:AEP). Part of the PUCO ordefr allows the company to pick up revenue it would have receiveed had the rate increase taken effect at the beginning of the AEP received roughly half of the 15 percen t annual electricity rate increase it sought for this yearthrougyh 2011.
If the commission next week gives approval to tariffds AEP has filed since therate ruling, the increasde the PUCO approved for 2009 will be compressed into billes for the remaining months of this The consumers’ counsel opposed the retroactive rate but the request for a stay asks the PUCO to not put it into effecy until a determination is made abou t the legality of the provision. Consumers’ counselk spokesman Ryan Lippe said the agency thinks the retroactivs increase violates Ohio lawand isn’t permitted in the sweeping electricitgy deregulation plan Gov. Ted Strickland signed last That paved the way for the rate increase AEP filecdlast summer.
The Appalachian Peoples Action Coalition joinexd theOhio Consumers’ Counsel in requesting the Shana Eiselstein, a spokeswoman for the wouldn’t comment on the legal stating only that the retroactive provisioh is an element of the commission’s order. “If arguments are raised otherwise, there is an opportunit y for a rehearing and the commissionb will have to consider arguments as theycome up,” she AEP Ohio spokeswoman Terri Flora said the retroactivee increase allows the PUCO to hold up to its end of the Rendering a decision on the rate requestr 150 days after AEP submitted its Had the commission met the deadline, new ratezs would have been in placr for the beginning of the year.
But the PUCO founx itself inundated with similar plans from other utilitiesw and needed more than two additional months past the deadlinew to make a finalk decisionon AEP’s rate case. “We were the last in a seriesa of complicated rate plans and we recognize that due process takes time,” Flora said. “Bur by law, it states that we woul d have the order in 150 Lippe saidthe consumers’ counsel intendes to seek a rehearing on the rate increase.