Your Cooperative is a non-profit organization owned by the members, or consumers, it serves. Members, as owners of the Cooperative, are called upon to supply capital to the Cooperative much the same as the owners of any other business. This is supplied by the surplus of the Cooperative's revenue over its operating costs on an annual basis. This capital may also be called margins or earnings. This is the only form of equity or "ownership" the Cooperative has.
Each time you pay your electric bill, you are making an investment in Guernsey-Muskingum Electric Cooperative. For instance, if in a given year, the Cooperative's margins were 8 percent of total revenue, for each $100 you paid for electric service, $8 was credited to your capital account. Every year, the Cooperative notifies each member/owner of the amount of capital credits they have been assigned for the prior year. Beginning in May 2000, this notification was included in the note area on the bills of current members. A separate letter is mailed to consumers who are no longer receiving service from Guernsey-Muskingum.
Your Cooperative retains this capital until the financial condition of the Cooperative permits the return of the money to the member. In order to allow more members to have an opportunity to share in a general retirement of capital credits, our method of retiring capital credits will continue to be a percentage of the total capital method. This means that each member will receive a refund for a percentage of the total capital in their account.
Your elected Board of Directors decides when capital credits will be allocated and retired. If you move off Guernsey-Muskingum's lines, please keep us informed of your current address so your capital credits can be mailed to your new address.