Oil & Gas Litigation
Are you being paid all the royalties to which you are entitled?
Even though the mineral owner owns all of the rights, lease contracts have traditionally given the owner back as little as 1/8 of the value of the oil and gas produced. Nevertheless, even thought the company is already receiving the lion share of the proceeds, companies often device schemes to cheat royalty owners out of their contractual share. You need legal assistance to negotiate these leases and to ensure the company is paying you properly after the well is complete.
Failure to drill - to "commence operations"When times were good in the oil and gas business, lots of companies signed as many leases as they could. Now that the price of oil and has has declined, those same companies are often failing to commence drilling operations within the "primary term" of the lease. Generally, if the company doesn't drill within a period of time (often 3 years), the lease ends, and the royalty owner gets to lease the rights again, receiving another "bonus" payment. Companies desperately want to avoid this outcome, so they often undertake some minimal activity, but do not actually drill. They do this to try to prevent the lease from ending. If you feel like this may be happening to you, you should contact an attorney ASAP to deal with the time-sensitive situation.
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