Fall River Electric pays $1.5 million to customers

The following is a news release from Fall River Electric Cooperative.
ASHTON — Fall River Electric Cooperative announces the payment this month of $1.5 million in the form of an Instant Owner Rebate to owner-members (customers) of the Cooperative. The Fall River board wanted to return current profits, referred to as margins, to all the Cooperative’s owners.
This $1.5 million will be infused back into many of the local economies of the communities of eastern Idaho and southwestern Montana. This is on top of the $2.6 million plus paid out to owner-members in December through the Cooperative’s annual Patronage Capital program, meaning Fall River Electric has now distributed over $4.1 million dollars within less than sixty days.
February’s disbursement is to those customers that purchased power last year while the December payments were to members of the Co-op that purchased power back in 2004 to early 2005. The patronage capital program is where extra revenues over the cost of operations is then disbursed to its owner-members on an approximate twenty-year cycle. Unlike investor-owned utilities that pay profits to stockholders, Fall River Electric’s patronage capital is a customer’s investment in the Cooperative.
Regarding this month’s $1.5 million disbursement, Fall River Electric’s CEO Bryan Case said, “Fall River Electric’s board and management have orchestrated significant steps to vastly improve the Cooperative’s financial condition which has resulted in the Co-op’s ability to pay out these major sums to our members.”
Case added, “The patronage capital amount paid in December was the largest single year payment ever made while this month’s Instant Owner Rebate is only the third time a rebate has occurred in the Cooperative’s nearly 85-year history.”
The amount of each rebate is based on how much each owner-member paid for electricity in 2022 and is being provided as a credit on their February statements.
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Source: eastidahonews.com