FPL to refund $27.7 million in storm fees

Customers would receive $3.18 credit

Whoopee! Three dollars are coming back to your wallet.

Florida Power & Light Co. has agreed to refund $27.7 million to customers for 2016’s Hurricane Matthew costs in a deal with the Office of Public Counsel. The refund includes $6 million in “overrecovery” charges and $21.7 million in accounting adjustments, according to a settlement filed Tuesday with the Florida Public Service Commission.

The refund would result in a one-time $3.18 credit on electric bills for a customer who uses the typical 1,000 kilowatt hours of electricity a month, according to the settlement. The deal still has to be approved by the Florida Public Service Commission, which regulates the state’s utilities.

FPL spokesman Christopher McGrath said the refund is the result of “adjustments to the accounting treatment for a portion of the costs.”

The Juno Beach-based utility collected $322.45 million from customers for recovery from Matthew, which resulted in power outages for 1.2 million customers in the state.

About $6 million are listed in the agreement as “over-recovery” costs, according to the Public Counsel.

The tricounty region got lucky in the storm as Hurricane Matthew moved to the east, helping avoid a South Florida landfall by keeping the storm farther from shore, according to the National Weather Service.

In February 2017, the Florida Public Service Commission granted FPL’s request and allowed the state’s largest utility to collect an additional $3.36 per 1,000 kilowatt-hours of electricity used. The 12-month surcharge expired in March.

In May, Michigan-based senior regulatory analyst Helmut Schultz, who did an analysis on behalf of the Public Counsel, testified that certain claimed expenses by FPL should be disallowed because of lack of or questionable documentation. They included nearly $18 million in crew