Capital Credits

Your cooperative is not in business to make a profit to benefit shareholders, but instead is here to offer an at-cost service to its member-owners. Our rates are structured in a manner to collect enough money to cover our cost of doing business. When the money we collect for payment of bills exceeds the amount actually required to meet the immediate expenses of the cooperative, under generally accepted accounting principles and lender requirements a portion of that amount is allocated to your capital credit account based on the amount you have contributed through payment of your monthly power bill. This means that everyone’s allocation is for a different amount.

Dixie does hold a portion of the monies collected for unexpected emergency expenses, like those caused by tornadoes and hurricanes. And, some of the reserves go to improve your cooperative’s electric system. But, as you can see, the money we receive is used to benefit our member-owners.

Each year our board has the privilege of reviewing the financial status of the cooperative in order to determine if there are funds available to distribute capital credits to our member-owners. This year, the board has approved the payment of capital credits from 1985-1986. This translates into $887,268 being given back to individuals who were members of the cooperative during that year.

You may be wondering how the cooperative determines which years to pay. Your cooperative’s bylaws actually require payment of capital credits to be made by the First In First Out (FIFO) method. This means that the first active members of the cooperative are the first to receive capital credits.

Since 1997, your board of trustees has approved payment of about $4.5 million in capital credit refunds. Member-owners from 1985 and 1986 who have valid mailing addresses are automatically mailed a check in mid-December. If a debt is owed to the cooperative by the individual eligible for a capital credit refund, the amount of the debt will be subtracted from the refund. For those individuals who are unlocatable, a list was inserted in the November 2012 issue of Alabama Living. The list can also be viewed through the download section below.

Downloads

Title	Date ↓
Capital Credits Insert 1985-1986	11/01/2012