[Federal Register Volume 59, Number 104 (Wednesday, June 1, 1994)]
[Unknown Section]
[Page 0]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 94-13305]


[[Page Unknown]]

[Federal Register: June 1, 1994]


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DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY
 

Implementation of Special Refund Procedures

AGENCY: Office of Hearings and Appeals, Department of Energy.

ACTION: Notice of implementation of special refund procedures.

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SUMMARY: The Office of Hearings and Appeals (OHA) of the Department of 
Energy (DOE) announces the procedures for disbursement of $38,214.98, 
plus accrued interest, in refined petroleum overcharges obtained by the 
DOE under the terms of a Remedial Order issued to County Fuel Company, 
Inc., Case No. LEF-0015. The OHA has determined that the funds will be 
distributed in accordance with the provisions of 10 CFR part 205, 
Subpart V and 15 U.S.C. 4501, the Petroleum Overcharge Distribution and 
Restitution Act (PODRA).

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:Richard T. Tedrow, Deputy Director, 
Office of Hearings and Appeals, 1000 Independence Avenue, SW., 
Washington, DC 20585, (202) 586-6602.

DATE and ADDRESS: Applications for Refund must be filed in duplicate, 
addressed to County Fuel Company, Inc. Special Refund Proceeding and 
sent to: Office of Hearings and Appeals, Department of Energy, 1000 
Independence Avenue SW., Washington, DC 20585. Applications should 
display a prominent reference to the Case Number LEF-0015 and be 
postmarked on or before November 30, 1994.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: In accordance with 10 CFR 205.282(b), notice 
is hereby given of the issuance of the Decision and Order set out 
below. The Decision and Order sets forth the procedures that the DOE 
has formulated to distribute to eligible claimants $38,214.98, plus 
accrued interest, obtained by the DOE under the terms of a Remedial 
Order that the DOE issued to County Fuel Company, Inc., on May 7, 1984. 
Under the Remedial Order, County Fuel Company, Inc., was found to have 
violated the federal petroleum price and allocation regulations 
involving the sale of motor gasoline during the relevant audit period.
    The OHA has determined to distribute the Remedial Order fund in a 
two stage refund proceeding. Purchasers of motor gasoline from County 
Fuel Company, Inc., will have an opportunity to submit refund 
applications in the first stage. The specific requirements which an 
applicant must meet in order to receive a refund are set out in Section 
III of the Decision. Claimants who meet these specific requirements 
will be eligible to receive refunds based on the number of gallons of 
motor gasoline which they purchased from County Fuel Company, Inc.
    In the event that money remains after all first stage claims have 
been disposed of, the remaining funds will be disbursed in accordance 
with the provisions of 15 U.S.C. 4501, the Petroleum Overcharge 
Distribution and Restitution Act of 1986 (PODRA).
    Applications for Refund must be postmarked on or before November 
30, 1994. Instructions for the completion of refund applications are 
set forth in Section IV of the Decision that immediately follows this 
notice. Applications should be sent to the address listed at the 
beginning of this notice.
    Unless labelled as ``confidential,'' all submissions must be made 
available for public inspection between the hours of 1 p.m. and 5 p.m., 
Monday through Friday, except federal holidays, in the Public Reference 
Room of the Office of Hearings and Appeals, located in room 1E-234, 
1000 Independence Avenue SW., Washington, DC 20585.

    Dated: May 24, 1994.
George B. Breznay,
Director, Office of Hearings and Appeals.
    Name of Firm: County Fuel Company, Inc.
    Date of Filing: March 6, 1990.
    Case Number: LEF-0015.
    Under the procedural regulations of the Department of Energy (DOE), 
the Economic Regulatory Administration (ERA) may request that the 
Office of Hearings and Appeals (OHA) formulate and implement special 
refund procedures. 10 CFR 205.281. These procedures are used to refund 
monies to those injured by actual or alleged violations of the DOE 
price regulations.
    In this Decision and Order, we consider a Petition for 
Implementation of Special Refund Procedures filed by the ERA on March 
6, 1990, for funds obtained due to alleged pricing violations in the 
sale of motor gasoline at wholesale and retail levels. The funds at 
issue in that Petition were obtained through DOE enforcement 
proceedings involving County Fuel Company, Inc. (County), pursuant to 
10 CFR part 205, subpart V. The present Decision will set forth final 
procedures for the distribution of these funds to qualified purchasers 
of County's motor gasoline.

I. Background

    During the period covered by the Remedial Order (March 1, 1979, 
through March 18, 1980), County was a ``reseller-retailer'' of refined 
petroleum products as that term was defined in 10 CFR 212.31 and was 
located in Baltimore, Maryland. Accordingly, County was subject to the 
DOE Mandatory Petroleum Price Regulations. An ERA audit of County 
records revealed possible violations of these regulations in sales of 
County's motor gasoline during the period March 1, 1979, through March 
18, 1980. On the basis of this audit, the ERA issued a Proposed 
Remedial Order (PRO) to County on May 24, 1982. This Office affirmed 
these alleged violations and issued a Remedial Order to County on May 
7, 1984. County Fuel Company, Inc., 12 DOE  83,007 (1984). The 
Remedial Order was affirmed by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission 
on August 23, 1985. County Fuel Company, Inc., 32 FERC  61,301 (1985). 
The Temporary Emergency Court of Appeals (TECA) affirmed the decision 
on August 12, 1987. County Fuel Company, Inc., v. DOE, 3 Fed. Energy 
Guidelines  26,588 (Temp. Emer. Ct. App. 1987).
    However, County had filed for bankruptcy on July 6, 1981. Following 
the TECA decision, the DOE's claim as an unsecured creditor was allowed 
by the bankruptcy court in the amount of $254,766.49, including 
interest. In re: County Fuel Company, Inc., No. 81-2-2208-L (D. Md. 
1986). Under the Second Amended Plan of Reorganization, unsecured 
creditors were paid 15 percent of the allowed claim in cash or 100 
percent of the claim in common stock. On August 25, 1988, County 
delivered a check in the amount of $38,214.98 to the DOE, representing 
15 percent of the allowed claim. The ERA accepted this amount in lieu 
of payment in common stock. Interest in the amount of $14,047.66 has 
accrued as of March 31, 1994.

II. The Proposed Decision and Order

    On March 8, 1994, the OHA issued a Proposed Decision and Order 
(PDO) establishing tentative procedures to distribute the alleged 
violation amount obtained from County. 59 FR 11979 (March 15, 1994). 
The OHA tentatively outlined procedures under which purchasers of 
County's motor gasoline could apply for refunds. In order to permit 
applicants to make refund claims without incurring disproportionate 
costs as well as to allow the OHA to equitably and efficiently consider 
those claims, we set forth a number of presumptions pertaining to 
refund procedures.
    First, we presumed that the alleged refined product overcharges 
were spread evenly over all of County's sales of motor gasoline during 
the Remedial Order period. We therefore proposed that an applicant's 
potential refund generally should be computed by multiplying the per-
gallon refund amount by the number of gallons of County's motor 
gasoline that the claimant purchased during the Remedial Order period. 
The resulting figure is referred to as the claimant's ``volumetric 
share'' of the County Remedial Order funds. Because an applicant may 
have been overcharged by more than the volumetric refund presumption by 
showing that it sustained a greater amount of the overcharge.
    Because it is potentially difficult, time-consuming, and expensive 
to demonstrate that one was forced to absorb any overcharges from 
County, we proposed to adopt a number of presumptions concerning 
injury. We proposed that resellers and retailers claiming refunds of 
$5,000 or less, end-users, agricultural cooperatives, and certain types 
of regulated firms would be presumed injuried by County's alleged 
overcharges. We proposed that refiners, resellers and retailers seeking 
refunds greater than $5,000 could receive a maximum of $20,000 based 
upon 40 percent of their volumetric share without having to prove 
injury. We also proposed to presume that claimants who made only spot 
purchases from County were not injured and must rebut that presumption 
to receive a refund. We stated that applicants not covered by one of 
the injury presumptions would be required to demonstrate that they were 
forced to absorb any overcharge by County in order to receive their 
full volumetric shares of the County Remedial Order funds.
    Finally, we proposed that any money remaining after all County 
refund claims are analyzed should be disbursed as indirect restitution 
in accordance with the provisions of the Overcharge Distribution and 
Restitution Act of 1986 (PODRA), 15 U.S.C. Sec. Sec. 4501-4507 (1988).
    The PDO provided a period of 30 days from the date of publication 
in the Federal Register in which comments could be filed regarding the 
tentative refund process. More than 30 days have elapsed and the OHA 
has received no comments concerning the proposed procedures for the 
distribution of the County settlement funds. Consequently, the 
procedures will be adopted as proposed.

III. Refund Procedures

A. Eligibility for Refunds

    As indicated above, the Remedial Order found that County 
overcharged its customers a total of $197,305.49, excluding interest, 
in violating 10 CFR 212.93, by charging prices in excess of its maximum 
lawful selling prices for motor gasoline. Accordingly, to the extent 
that is possible, the County Remedial Order amount of $38,214.98, plus 
accrued interest, will be distributed to purchasers of covered County 
motor gasoline who can show that they were injured by County's pricing 
practices during the period March 1, 1979, through March 18, 1980.

B. Calculation of Refund Amount

    We are adopting a volumetric method to apportion the County escrow 
account. Under this volumetric refund approach, a claimant's allocable 
share of the refined products pool is equal to the number of gallons of 
covered products purchased during the Remedial Order period times a per 
gallon refund amount. We will derive the volumetric figure (per gallon 
refund amount) by dividing the $38,214.98 received from County by the 
total volume of motor gasoline sold by the firm during the regulatory 
period, 2,431,180 gallons. This yields a volumetric refund amount of 
$.0157 per gallon, exclusive of interest.\1\ This method is based upon 
the presumption that the alleged overcharges were spread equally over 
all gallons of motor gasoline sold by County during the regulatory 
period. E.g., American Pac. Int'l, Inc., 14 DOE  85,158, at 88,293 
(1986).\2\
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    \1\In the PDO, we included the interest which had accrued as of 
January 31, 1994, in the County Remedial Order Fund. It has come to 
our attention that this would lower the actual amount of restitution 
an applicant would receive when taking advantage of one of the 
presumptions. Therefore, in this Final Decision and Order, we have 
decided to only use the amount actually collected from County to 
compute the volumetric amount.
    \2\Nevertheless, we realize that the impact on an individual 
claimant may have been greater than the volumetric amount. 
Therefore, the volumetric presumption will be rebuttable, and we 
will allow a claimant to submit evidence detailing the specific 
overcharges that it incurred in order to be eligible for a larger 
refund. E.g., Standard Oil Co./Army and Air Force Exchange Serv., 12 
DOE  85,015 (1984). Such an application will be granted only if an 
applicant makes a persuasive showing that: (1) it was 
``overcharged'' by a specific amount, (2) it sustained a 
disproportionate share of County's alleged overcharges, and (3) it 
was injured by those overcharges. See MCO Holdings, Inc., MGPC, 
Inc./Little America Refining Co., 19 DOE  85,560 (1989); Marathon 
Petroleum Co./Red Diamond Oil Co., 19 DOE  85,543 (1989); Getty Oil 
Co./Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad Co., 18 DOE  85,107 
(1988). To the extent that a claimant makes this showing, it will 
receive a refund above the volumetric refund level. In computing the 
appropriate refunds of this type, we will prorate the refund amount 
by the ratio of the County remedial order amount as compared to the 
aggregate overcharge amount alleged by the ERA. Amtel, Inc./Whitco, 
Inc., 19 DOE  85,319 (1989) (Amtel/Whitco).
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    Under the volumetric approach, an eligible claimant will receive a 
refund equal to the number of gallons of covered products that it 
purchased from County during the period March 1, 1979, through March 
18, 1980, multiplied by the per gallon volumetric amount for this 
proceeding. Accordingly, each claimant will be required to establish, 
by documentation of reasonable estimation, the volume of products that 
it purchased during this period. In addition, each successful claimant 
will receive a pro rata portion of the interest that has accrued on the 
County funds since the date of remittance. As in previous cases, we 
will establish a minimum amount of $15 for refund claims. E.g., Uban 
Oil Co., 9 DOE 82,541, at 85,225 (1982). Accordingly, an applicant 
must have purchased at least 924 gallons of motor gasoline from County 
in order for its claim to be considered.

C. Showing of Injury

    Each claimant will be required to document its purchases of covered 
products from County during the Remedial Order period. In addition, in 
order to receive a refund, an applicant generally must demonstrate 
through the submission of detailed evidence that it did not pass on the 
alleged overcharges to its customers. See, e.g., Office of Enforcement, 
8 DOE 82,597, at 85,396-97 (1981).
    However, as we have done in many prior refund cases, we will adopt 
a number of presumptions regarding injury for claimants in each 
category listed below. These presumptions are intended to ease what 
would be a time-consuming and potentially expensive process if an 
applicant were forced to demonstrate that they absorbed the alleged 
overcharges.
1. End-Users
    In accordance with prior Subpart V proceedings,we are adopting the 
presumption that an end-user or ultimate consumer of County motor 
gasoline whose business is unrelated to the petroleum industry was 
injured by the alleged overcharges settled by the remedial order. See, 
e.g., Texas Oil and Gas Corp. 12 DOE 85,069, at 88,209 (1984) (TOGCO). 
Unlike regulated firms in the petroleum industry, members of this group 
generally were not subject to price controls during the remedial order 
period and were not required to keep records which justified selling 
price increases by reference to cost increases. Consequently, analysis 
of the impact of the alleged overcharges on the final prices of goods 
and services produced by members of this group would be beyond the 
scope of the refund proceeding. Id. Therefore, end-users of County 
motor gasoline need only document their purchase volumes from County 
during the remedial order period to make a sufficient showing that they 
were injured by the alleged overcharges.
2. Regulated Firms and Cooperatives
    In order to receive a full volumetric refund, a claimant whose 
prices for goods and services are regulated by a governmental agency, 
i.e., a public utility, or an agricultural cooperative which is 
required by its charter to pass through cost savings to its member 
purchasers, need only submit documentation of purchases used by itself 
or, in the case of a cooperative, sold to its members. However, a 
regulated firm or a cooperative will also be required to certify that 
it will pass any refund received through to its customers or member-
customers, provide us with a full explanation of how it plans to 
accomplish the restitution, and certify that it will notify the 
appropriate regulatory body or membership group of the receipt of the 
refund. See Marathon, 14 DOE at 88,514-15. This requirement is based 
upon the presumption that, with respect to a regulated firm, any 
overcharge would have been routinely passed through to its customers. 
Similarly, any refunds received should be passed through to its 
customers. With respect to a cooperative, in general, the cooperative 
agreement which controls its business operations would ensure that the 
alleged overcharges, and similarly refunds, would be passed through to 
its member-customers. Accordingly, these firms will not be required to 
make a detailed demonstration of injury.\3\
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    \3\A cooperative's purchases of County products which were 
resold to non-members will be treated in a manner consistent with 
purchases made by other resellers. See Total Petroleum, Inc./Farmers 
Petroleum Cooperative, Inc., 19 DOE 85,215 (1989).
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3. Refiners, Resellers, and Retailers
    a. Small claims presumption. We will adopt a ``small claims'' 
presumption that resellers requesting relatively small refunds were 
injured by the alleged overcharges. Under the small claims presumption, 
a refiner, reseller, or retailer seeking a refund to $5,000 or less, 
exclusive of interest, will not be required to submit evidence of 
injury beyond documentation of the volume of County products it 
purchased during the remedial order period. See TOGCO, 12 DOE at 
88,210. This presumption is based on the fact that there may be 
considerable expense involved in gathering the types of data necessary 
to support a detailed claim of injury; for small claims the expense 
might even exceed the potential refund. Consequently, failure to allow 
simplified refund procedures for small claims could deprive injured 
parties of their opportunity to obtain a refund. Furthermore, use of 
the small claims presumption is desirable because it allows the OHA to 
process the large number of routine refund claims in an efficient 
manner.\4\
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    \4\In order to qualify for a refund under the small claims 
presumption, a refiner, reseller, or retailer must have purchased 
less than 318,503 gallons of County motor gasoline during the 
remedial order period.
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    b. Mid-level claim presumption. In addition, a refiner, reseller, 
or retailer claimant whose allocable share of the refund pool exceeds 
$5,000, excluding interest, may elect to receive as its refund either 
$5,000 or 40 percent of its allocable share, up to $20,000,\5\ 
whichever is larger.\6\ The use of this presumption reflects our 
conviction that these larger, mid-level claimants were likely to have 
experienced some injury as a result of the alleged overcharges. See 
Marathon, 14 DOE at 88,515. We are adopting a 40 percent presumptive 
level of injury for all mid-level claimants in this proceeding. 
Consequently, an applicant in this group will only be required to 
provide documentation of its purchase volumes of County motor gasoline 
during the remedial order period in order to be eligible to receive a 
refund of 40 percent of its total allocable share, up to $20,000, or 
$5,000, whichever is greater.\7\
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    \5\In most prior proceedings, we have used a $40,000 mid-level 
claim presumption. However, due to the small size of the County 
Remedial Order Fund, this amount would be impractical.
    \6\That is, claimants who purchased more than 318,504 gallons of 
County motor gasoline during the remedial order period (mid-level 
claimants) may elect to utilize this presumption.
    \7\A claimant who attempt to make a detailed showing of injury 
in order to obtain 100 percent of its allocable share but, instead, 
provides evidence that leads us to conclude that it passed through 
all of the alleged overcharges, or that it is eligible for a refund 
of less than the applicable presumption-level refund, may not then 
be eligible for a presumption-based refund. Instead, such a claimant 
may receive a refund which reflects the level of injury established 
in its application. No refund will be approved if its submission 
indicates that it was not injured as a result of its purchases from 
County. See Exxon, 17 DOE at 89,150 n.10.
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    c. Spot purchasers. We are adopting a rebuttable presumption that a 
reseller that made only spot purchases from County did not suffer 
injury as a result of those purchases. As we have previously stated, 
spot purchasers generally had considerable discretion as to the timing 
and market in which they made their purchases and therefore would not 
have made spot market purchases from a firm at increased prices unless 
they were able to pass through the full amount of the firm's selling 
price to their own customers. See, e.g., Vickers, 8 DOE at 85,396-97. 
Accordingly, a spot purchaser claimant must submit specific and 
detailed evidence to rebut the spot purchaser presumption and to 
establish the extent to which it was injured as a result of its spot 
purchases from County.\8\
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    \8\In prior proceedings, we have stated that refunds will be 
approved for spot purchasers who demonstrate that: (1) they made the 
spot purchases for the purpose of ensuring a supply for their base 
period customers rather than in anticipation of financial advantage 
as a result of those purchases and (20 they were forced by market 
conditions to resell the product at a loss.
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    4. Allocation claims. We may also receive claims based upon 
County's alleged failure to furnish motor gasoline that it was obliged 
to supply under the DOE allocation regulations that became effective in 
January 1974. See 10 CFR part 211. Any such applications will be 
evaluated with reference to the standards set forth in Subpart V 
implementation cases such as Office of Special Counsel, 10 DOE 85,048, 
at 88,220 (1982), and refund application cases such as Mobil Oil Corp./
Reynolds Industries, Inc., 17 DOE 85,608 (1988); Marathon Petroleum 
Co./Research Fuels, Inc., 19 DOE 85,575 (1989) (Marathon/RFI), aff'd 
sub nom. Research Fuels, Inc. versus Department of Energy, No. CA-3-89-
2983G (N.D. Tex. 1990), aff'd, 977 F.2d 601 (Temp. Emer. Ct. App. 
1992). These standards generally require an allocation claimant to 
demonstrate the existence of a supplier/purchaser relationship with the 
remedial order firm and the likelihood that the remedial order firm 
failed to furnish motor gasoline that it was obliged to supply to the 
claimant under 10 CFR part 211. In addition, the claimant should 
provide evidence that it had contemporaneously notified the DOE or 
otherwise sought redress from the alleged allocation violation. 
Finally, the claimant must establish that it was injured and document 
the extent of the injury.
    In our evaluation of whether allocation claims meet these 
standards, we will consider various factors. For example, we will seek 
to obtain as much information as possible about the agency's treatment 
of complaints made to it by the claimant. We will also look at any 
affirmative defenses that County may have had to the alleged allocation 
violation. See Marathon/RFI, 19 DOE 85,575. In assessing an allocation 
claimant's injury, we will evaluate the effect of the alleged 
allocation violation on its entire business operations with particular 
reference to the amount of product that it received from suppliers 
other than County. In determining the amount of an allocation refund, 
we will utilize any information that may be available regarding the 
portion of the County remedial order amount that the agency attributed 
to allocation violations in general and to the specific allocation 
violation alleged by the claimants. Finally, since the County Remedial 
Order Fund is less than County's potential liability in the 
proceedings, we will pro rate those allocation refunds that would 
otherwise be disproportionately large in relation to the remedial order 
fund. Cf. Amtel/Whitco, 19 DOE 85,319.

D. Distribution of Funds Remaining After First Stage

    In the event that money remains after all refund claims from the 
County fund have been analyzed, the remaining funds in that account 
will be disbursed as indirect restitution in accordance with the 
provisions of the Petroleum Overcharge Distribution and Restitution Act 
of 1986 (PODRA), 15 U.S.C. 4501-07. PODRA requires that the Secretary 
of Energy determine annually the amount of oil overcharge funds that 
will not be required to refund monies to injured parties in Subpart V 
proceedings and make those funds available to state governments for use 
in energy conservation programs. The Secretary has delegated these 
responsibilities to the OHA, and any funds in the County remedial order 
escrow account that the OHA determined will not be needed to effect 
direct restitution to injured customers will be distributed in 
accordance with the provisions of PODRA.

IV. General Refund Application Requirements

    Pursuant to 10 C.F.R. 205.283, we will now accept Applications for 
Refund from individuals and firms that purchased motor gasoline sold by 
County during the period March 1, 1979, through March 18, 1980. There 
is no specific application form that must be used. However, the 
following information should be included in all Applications for 
Refund:
    (1) Identifying information including the claimant's name, current 
business address, business address during the refund period, taxpayer 
identification number, a statement indicating whether the claimant is a 
corporation, partnership, sole proprietorship, or other business 
entity, the name, title, and telephone number of a person to contact 
for any additional information, and the name and address of the person 
who should receive any refund check.\9\ If the applicant operated under 
more than one name or under a different name during the price control 
period, the applicant should specify these names.
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    \9\Under the Privacy Act of 1974, the submission of a social 
security number by an individual applicant is voluntary. An 
applicant that does not wish to submit a social security number must 
submit an employer identification number if one exists. This 
information will be used in processing refund applications, and is 
requested pursuant to our authority under the Petroleum Overcharge 
Distribution and Restitution Act of 1986 and the regulations 
codified at 10 CFR part 205, subpart V. The information may be 
shared with other Federal agencies for statistical, auditing or 
archiving purposes, and with law enforcement agencies when they are 
investigating a potential violation of civil or criminal law. Unless 
an applicant claims confidentiality, this information will be 
available to the public in the Public Reference Room of the OHA.
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    (2) If the applicant's firm is owned by another company, or owns 
other companies, a list of those companies' names, addresses, and 
descriptions of their relationship to the applicant's firm.
    (3) A brief description of the claimant's business and the manner 
in which it used the petroleum products listed on its application.
    (4) A monthly schedule of the applicant's purchases of motor 
gasoline that it purchased from County during the Remedial Order 
period. The applicant must indicate the name of its supplier and the 
delivery location. The applicant should indicate the source of its 
volume information. Monthly schedules should be based upon actual, 
contemporaneous business records. If such records are not available, 
the applicant may submit estimates provided that those estimates are 
reasonable and the estimation methodology is explained in detail.
    (5) If the applicant was an indirect purchaser, it should submit 
the name, address, and telephone number of its immediate supplier and 
indicate why it believes that the motor gasoline was originally sold by 
County.
    (6) A statement whether the applicant or a related firm has filed, 
or authorized any individual to file on its behalf, any other 
Application for Refund in the County proceeding, and if so, the 
circumstances surrounding that filing or authorization.
    (7) A statement whether the applicant was in any way affiliated 
with County. If so, the applicant should explain the nature of the 
affiliation.
    (8) If the applicant is a reseller, retailer, or refiner whose 
volumetric share exceeds $5,000, it must indicate whether it elects to 
receive its maximum refund under the presumptions of injury. If it does 
not elect a presumption of injury, it must submit a detailed showing 
that it was injured by County's pricing practices.
    (9) If the applicant is a regulated utility or a cooperative, 
certifications that it will pass on the entirety of any refund received 
to its customers, will notify its state utility commission, other 
regulatory agency, or membership body of the receipt of any refund, and 
a brief description as to how the refund will be passed along.
    (10) A statement whether there has been any change in the ownership 
of the entity that purchased the covered County products at any time 
during or after the refund period. If so, the name and address of the 
current (or former) owner should be provided.
    (11) The statement listed below signed by the individual applicant 
or a responsible official of the company filing the refund application:

    I swear (or affirm) that this is the only refund Application 
filed on behalf of this applicant in the County Fuel Company, Inc. 
special refund proceeding and that the information contained in this 
Application and its attachments is true and correct to the best of 
my knowledge and belief. I understand that anyone who is convicted 
of providing false information to the federal government may be 
subject to a fine, a jail sentence, or both, pursuant to 18 U.S.C. 
Sec. 1001. I understand that the information contained in this 
Application is subject to public disclosure. I have enclosed a 
duplicate of this entire Application which will be placed in the OHA 
Public Reference Room.

    We also invite each applicant to submit copies of no more than five 
contemporaneous invoices or other proofs of purchase showing that it 
purchased motor gasoline from County. While this information is not 
required of refund applicants, it may well expedite the processing of 
the refund application.
    All applications should be either typed or printed and clearly 
labeled ``County Fuel Company, Inc. Application for Refund.'' Each 
applicant must submit an original and one copy of the application. If 
the applicant believes that any of the information in its application 
is confidential and does not wish for this information to be publicly 
disclosed, it must submit an original application, clearly designated 
``confidential,'' containing the confidential information, and two 
copies of the application with the confidential information deleted. 
All refund applications should be sent to: County Fuel Company, Inc. 
Refund Proceeding, Case No. LEF-0015, Office of Hearings and Appeals, 
Department of Energy, 1000 Independence Ave., SW., Washington, DC 
20585.
    The filing deadline is November 30, 1994.

    It Is Therefore Ordered That:
    (1) Applications for Refund from the funds remitted to the 
Department of Energy by County Fuel Company, Inc., pursuant to the 
Remedial Order finalized on May 7, 1984, may now be filed.
    (2) All Applications submitted pursuant to Paragraph (1) above must 
be filed in duplicate and postmarked no later than November 30, 1994.
    Dated: May 24, 1994.
George B. Breznay,
Director Office of Hearings and Appeals.
[FR Doc. 94-13305 Filed 5-31-94; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 6450-01-P