Arco Moves to End Contract with Sigesa Over Gas Dispute

All united against Sigesa. The Arco City Council, during the lengthy meeting held the other evening, extensively discussed the issue regarding the distribution of natural gas within the Arco territory, a distribution that falls under the jurisdiction of Sigesa spa by convention.

The relationship between the Milanese company and the city of palms has deteriorated following the tangled matter of Sigesa’s failure to provide the anticipated discounts.

It is precisely for this reason that the Arco civic assembly, on Monday evening, strongly reiterated the need to immediately terminate this “stormy” relationship.

With only one vote against, the motion proposed by Fabio Zanetti, a councilor from Forza Italia, was approved. It commits the mayor “to immediately pursue all necessary actions, already under consideration by the administration, to protect the interests of the municipality through the termination of the current contractual relationship with Sigesa.”

Methods of Termination and Compensation

This termination can be achieved through the redemption of the agreement (a costly operation that would cost the municipality several billion lire), or through the contract’s expiration due to default (a less risky option, according to the mayor, and therefore preferable).

Veronesi will also need to take steps to determine the exact amount of discounts paid so far.

In this regard, the same Sigesa issued a statement, as we anticipated in recent days, informing that they have already settled the owed amounts.

“Overall, we have reimbursed 1,633,051,945 lire including VAT,” states engineer Saccani from Sigesa. “This amount corresponds to what each user was owed, paid directly on their bill during the billing periods of June 19, 2000, and February 6, 2001.”

It is noted that 4,117 users were reimbursed on June 19, 2000, and 3,670 on February 6, 2001. We believe it is important to recall that the less-than-perfect application of discounts on our part, not due to miscalculation but due to material errors within our internal accounting and administrative system, initially resulted in an advantage for users by applying larger discounts than owed, which was later rectified to their detriment.”