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As of 1 June 2016 courts of the first instance satisfied nine claims of IDGC of Centre - Lipetskenergo division for provided electricity transmission services.
As a result of this, 694.1 million rubles were returned in favour of the company, including 30.4 million rubles of interest for untimely fulfillment of contractual obligations.
Currently 1,021 lawsuits of Lipetskenergo against unscrupulous consumers to recover 1.21 billion rubles of debt are pending in the courts. This amount exceeds the annual maintenance program of the branch of almost 7 times.
In addition, the debtor will have to pay 7 million rubles as interest. The basis for the penalties is recently adopted Federal Law from 03.11.2015 № 307-FZ "On Amendments to Certain Legislative Acts of the Russian Federation in connection with the strengthening of the payment discipline of energy consumers", designed to toughen the penalties for non-payment in the housing sector.
Among the main debtors of the branch are OJSC "Lipetsk Energy Retail Company" (LESK), LLC Lipetsk Pipe Company "Svobodny Sokol", JSC "Oboronenergosbyt".
The bulk of the debt, 1.08 billion rubles (89%), is with the electricity supplier of last resort in the region - LESK. In the production of the Arbitration Court of the Lipetsk region there are dozens of cases on disputes between IDGC of Centre and OJSC "LESK". They are connected with disagreements on the volume of electricity transmitted for various periods from 2011 to 2015. The most problematic of these until recently were the cases in which LESK did not recognize requirements of the power company due to unilateral termination of supply contracts with its customers-debtors. Today, the court found this argument unlawful. Especially in regard to the so-called categorical consumers, whose power supply limitation can lead to economic, environmental and social consequences. This is about artesian wells, water towers, water disposal facilities (sewers).
Protracted litigations with LESK, concerning set-offs, also ended with positive outcome in favour of "Lipetskenergo". The court ordered LESK to return debts to "Lipetskenergo" with interest payment for the use of borrowed money for a certain period of time.