How this can affect your bill
ONG informed all its customers on Sunday that natural gas prices are rising. That, combined with the historical usage figures, could ultimately affect customers’ bills both immediately and for a longer period of time.
The utility, Shortridge noted, shouldn’t make a profit on the gas it sells to its customers.
However, the price it pays for the fuel over an average period of time is passed on to customers through periodic rate adjustments that are reviewed and approved by the Oklahoma Corporation Commission’s public utility division. Those authorizations are conducted as part of tariff cases filed by the utility companies and approved by elected commissioners every year or so.
In recent years, utilities have generally sought adjustments to fuel costs on a semi-annual basis, as natural gas prices have been relatively stable.
But after one such event in 2000, natural gas companies sought monthly adjustments to their fuel costs until the markets settled, a spokesman for the agency said on Sunday.