Rate case data request management that serves every response on time, with one number for one thing
Every data request answered on time, with one number for one thing.
See one case, screen by screen ↓In a rate case, Commission Staff and every intervenor send the utility sets of written data requests about every number in the filing. A large case brings well over a thousand questions, each with a deadline the procedural order sets — often 10 business days to respond, less to object, and shorter still near the hearing. Today a regulatory analyst splits each PDF set by hand, works out who owns each question and which witness it falls under, and chases subject experts by email while they close the month.
Earlier answers sit on shared drives and are rarely reused, so the same question is researched twice — and answered twice, differently. Nobody checks every number in a new response against the testimony, the schedules and the answers already served. Late or thin answers bring motions to compel; two numbers for the same thing cost the witness credibility on the stand and can lead to disallowances.
Estimated split for one typical question in a large rate case, in hours, by hand and with the solution.
Six agents file, route, draft and check every response against the filing; the witness confirms and counsel signs.
Lumina Utilities is in its 2026 Electric General Rate Case, Docket E-26-0418 before the Arden Public Utility Commission: filed 14 Aug, $186.4M asked. It is Tue 13 Oct. Commission Staff Set 14 arrived on 6 Oct; its responses are due Tue 20 Oct. Here is what happens to Staff 14-07, screen by screen, in the working solution.
Dana owns the rate case. The strip across the top reads 1,284 questions in, 1,031 served, 253 open, 61 due this week, 4 at risk and 3 number conflicts. The inbox tray shows each set as it arrived, with its due and objection clocks, and two new sets — City of Westmere Set 2 and Staff Set 15 — wait to be filed. Down the right edge, eight coloured topic tabs: Revenue requirement & O&M holds 58 open.
“Staff 14-09 objection due today 17:00 · Helen Szabo”
The request reader split Staff Set 14 into 11 questions; 14-07 has three parts — by FERC account, reconcile to Schedule C-2, explain any difference. The router filed it under Revenue requirement & O&M with owner Tom Reyes and witness Priya Raman, due Tue 20 Oct. The drafter found three earlier answers — OCA 3-12, Staff 9-04 and Staff 6-11 from the 2022 case — and pulled the 2025 amounts by account from the ledger extract of 9 Oct.
Tom Reyes, 11:02: “593 includes the ice-storm reclass.”
The draft gives test-year distribution O&M, excluding vegetation, of $412.0 million. The checker reads every number in the draft and compares it with 27 places in the filing. Raman Direct, page 34, line 12 says $409.0 million; so do Schedule C-2, line 18 and the response to OCA 3-12, served 9 Sep. Sign-off is blocked until a person resolves it.
Margin note: “Conflicts with testimony page 34 — draft says $412.0M; Raman Direct p.34 l.12, Schedule C-2 l.18 and OCA 3-12 say $409.0M.”
Dana clicks the underlined $412.0 million and sees its trail: the testimony, Schedule C-2, workpaper WP-C2-4 and the responses to OCA 3-12 and Staff 9-04 all say $409.0M. Only the ledger extract of 9 Oct and the new draft say $412.0M — and the ledger includes JE 26-09-0147, posted 22 Sep, after the filing.
“Draft response to Staff 14-07 · $412.0M · Conflicts with the five places above”
The checker finds the cause in the ledger: journal entry JE 26-09-0147, approved by Aisha Grant, controller, reclassified $3.0 million of February 2025 ice-storm restoration from capital to account 593, maintenance of overhead lines. The number register keeps all 12 key figures of the case and their 295 places; distribution O&M shows “Conflict in a draft”.
Agent limit: the consistency checker never changes a filed number — it flags and proposes; people decide.
Two ways out are drafted. A: answer as filed, $409.0M, disclose the $3.0M entry and address it in rebuttal — recommended, the same as OCA 3-12. B: answer $412.0M and file errata to testimony page 34 and Schedule C-2, and supplement OCA 3-12. Dana picks A. The drafter rewrites the answer, puts account 593 back to $61.3M and adds the disclosure paragraph; the checker reads 23 numbers, all matching.
“Answered as filed · Dana Whitfield · 12:44”
The response goes to Priya Raman with the margin notes and the disclosure paragraph. She confirms it as witness at 12:46 and Dana approves. Helen Szabo, regulatory counsel, signs, and the response assembler serves it on the 14-party service list at 12:48, files the public version and logs it — a week before it is due.
“Served on 14 parties 12:48”
Staff 14-09 asks for all materials presented to the Board on the 2026 rate case. The objection screener drafts a partial objection: one of three documents is counsel's memo of 2 July, which is privileged; the Board presentations of 18 June and 23 July can be produced as Confidential under the protective order, by 20 October. Helen decides — sign and serve the objection, or answer in full.
Agent limit: the objection screener never files or serves an objection; counsel decides every one.
City of Westmere Set 2 arrived by email at 08:40: three pages, five questions. Kofi runs Split and file. Each question gets a topic, an owner and a witness, with responses due Tue 27 Oct and objections Tue 20 Oct. Question 2-04 asks for the names and addresses of customers disconnected for non-payment — it is held for Helen Szabo, with counts by month proposed instead.
“Objection screen: customer names and addresses are confidential — propose counts by month”
The deadlines view lays out 219 responses due between 13 and 30 Oct, by party and business day, against the procedural schedule: intervenor testimony on 9 Nov, after which discovery shortens to 5 business days; rebuttal on 1 Dec; the hearing 7–11 Dec. Four requests are at risk — no draft yet and due within 3 business days — and their experts were reminded at 08:00.
At risk: Staff 13-08 and CGA 2-05 (Carlos Duarte), OCA 6-09 (Ruth Adeyemi), AIEU 3-04 (Graham Holt).
The same rate case, seen by the five people who answer it — what their week looked like, and what it looks like now.
Six agents file, route, draft and check every response against the filing; the witness confirms and counsel signs.
Reads each incoming set (PDF or Word), splits every numbered question and sub-part, and records the party, set, the testimony page or schedule it refers to and one of the eight binder topics. Takes the due and objection dates from the procedural order and the date of service.
Assigns the owner by topic and the witness whose testimony covers the question, sends reminders 3 and 1 business days before the due date with the earlier answers attached, and flags a request at risk when it is due within 3 business days with no draft.
Finds earlier answers to the same question in this and earlier rate cases and drafts in the company's response style, taking every number from a filed source or the dated ledger extract and citing it.
Extracts every figure and claim from a draft and matches each to the number register — testimony, schedules, workpapers and served responses — within the tolerances in Settings. On a difference, looks for the cause in the ledger and writes a margin note with the sources.
Screens every question for privilege, customer privacy, confidentiality under the protective order, scope and burden, and drafts the narrowest objection that protects the company, with what can be produced instead.
Applies the docket format, makes a public version and, when needed, a confidential version for signatories of the protective order, numbers the attachments, serves on the service list, files the public version and updates the response log.
Signs and serves every response; the witness confirms, the rate case manager approves. The agents propose; a named person decides.
Ask in plain words. Every answer cites the filing, the schedules, the earlier responses or the ledger.
Why can't Staff 14-07 be signed yet?
The draft gives distribution O&M of $412.0M, but Ms. Raman's testimony says $409.0M at page 34, line 12, as do Schedule C-2 line 18 and the response to OCA 3-12 served on 9 Sep. The $3.0M difference is journal entry JE 26-09-0147, posted on 22 Sep, after the filing. I recommend answering as filed and disclosing the entry; the choice is yours.
What is due before Friday, and what is at risk?
61 responses are due from Tue 13 to Fri 16 Oct, under the 10-business-day rule. Four are at risk: Staff 13-08 and CGA 2-05 (Carlos Duarte), OCA 6-09 (Ruth Adeyemi) and AIEU 3-04 (Graham Holt) — none has a draft yet. Reminders went out at 08:00.
Have we answered distribution O&M by account before?
Yes, three times. OCA 3-12 in this case gave $409.0M; Staff 9-04 confirmed vegetation of $48.6M is excluded; and Staff 6-11 in the 2022 case gave the same table by FERC account, reconciled to Schedule C-2 line 18. The Staff 14-07 draft follows Staff 6-11.
Should we object to Staff 14-09?
In part. One of the three documents is counsel's memo of 2 Jul, which is privileged; the two Board presentations can be produced as Confidential under the protective order. The objection is due today at 17:00. Helen Szabo decides.
13 screens from the working solution, on its sample data. Pick one to see it large.
Deadlines, sign-off, number checks and confidentiality are settings for the docket. Changes are versioned and approved by regulatory counsel.
| Setting | Default | Choose from |
|---|---|---|
| Response period | 10 business days | From service of the request, per the procedural order of 2 Sep 2026 · the 11 Arden state holidays are skipped |
| Objection period | 5 business days | From service of the request |
| After intervenor testimony (9 Nov) | 5 / 3 business days | Response / objection periods once discovery shortens before the hearing |
| Reminders to experts | 3 and 1 business days | Before the due date, with the earlier answers attached |
| Rate case manager approves | On | Dana Whitfield, or Kofi Mensah up to $1M figures · counsel signs and serves, no one may skip |
| Dollar figures in testimony and schedules | exact to $0.1M | Tolerance for the check · percentages exact to 0.01 pt · customer counts rounded to the nearest 100 |
| Block sign-off on a conflict | On | Until the conflict is resolved and recorded |
| Disclose entries posted after the filing | On | In the response text · drafts use the ledger extract of 9 Oct 2026, refreshed weekly |
Every figure is labelled: a target the solution is built to, an estimate, a typical published result, or a proven one.
“demo” = seen in the working solution, on its sample rate case · “target” = the design goal, measured in the pilot · “estimated” = our arithmetic: 1,284 questions × 4 outside hours × 35 % drafted from earlier answers × $250 an hour; the hours split per question is also our estimate · “typical” = published figures: Missouri PSC EFIS 297391 (more than 3,000 questions in one case); procedural schedules setting 10 days to respond (10 business days in New Hampshire PUC DE 23-039; 10 days in Rhode Island PUC dockets 2301, 2404); Boston Globe, 2017 ($1.3M average legal and expert cost of a Massachusetts rate case since 2010). Context: motions to compel in Missouri ER-97-394 and Texas PUC Docket 49225; KPMG case study (inconsistent answers can lead to disallowances). Lumina Utilities, the Arden Public Utility Commission, every party, docket and person named on this page are fictional — characters and sample data in the working solution.
Software that takes every data request in a rate case from the set that arrives to the response that is served and logged. Rate Case Data Request Management adds six agents that split each set by topic, give each question an owner, a witness and a due date, draft the response from earlier answers and testimony, and check every number against the filing. The witness confirms and counsel signs and serves.
The request reader splits each incoming PDF or Word set into questions and takes the due and objection dates from the procedural order. The router assigns the owner and the witness and sends reminders 3 and 1 business days before the due date. The binder shows every open request by topic, the deadlines view shows what is due by party and day, and the log records every response served and every objection.
The consistency checker reads every number in every draft and compares it with the number register — every key figure in the filing and every place it appears: testimony page and line, schedule line, workpaper and earlier response. A conflict blocks sign-off until a person resolves it. In the sample case it caught $412.0M in a draft against $409.0M in the testimony and found the cause, an entry posted after the filing.
It is built to serve every response by its deadline. Due dates come from the procedural order, including the shorter periods before the hearing, experts are reminded before the due date, and a request is flagged at risk when it is due within 3 business days with no draft. In the sample case, 1,031 responses had been served with none late.
Yes. The drafter searches served responses from this and earlier rate cases — 4,182 of them in the sample — and drafts from the closest ones, citing each. In the sample case 38 % of drafts were written from an earlier answer, and the checker still compares every reused number with the current filing.
The objection screener flags questions that may be privileged, confidential, outside the case or unduly burdensome and drafts the narrowest objection, with what can be produced instead. Counsel decides every objection. Confidential versions go only to signatories of the protective order.
Yes. Agents draft, check and propose; they never change a filed number, never file an objection and never serve. The subject expert confirms the amounts, the witness confirms, the rate case manager approves and regulatory counsel signs and serves every response.
The Agentic Solution Engine builds and deploys it from your requirements and documents — your procedural order, testimony and schedules, and a sample of served responses — and it goes live once every quality gate has passed. We will walk you through it on your own data requests first.
Every filing position backed by how regulators actually ruled, cited and trended.
1-min demoRegulatory Commitment TrackingEvery directive owned and dated within a day of the order, and closed with its proof.
1-min demoRegulatory Change ManagementEach rule change mapped to the processes it touches the morning after it is adopted.
1-min demoWe'll run Rate Case Data Request Management on a set of your own data requests and the responses you have already served.