I put this in the general forum because it probably fits in a few different categories. The short version is, after a lease was acquired by a new operator 5 years ago, the new operator apparently had an error during the data migration and my relative’s royalty interest was put under a different name. This has been acknowledged in writing by the operator. Do we have a claim for the full 5 years of royalty payments that were either unpaid or paid to someone else incorrectly…or is there a legal limit on how many years back we can go?
Backstory: A relative of mine owned mineral rights in Oklahoma and received royalty payments from Company A. The lease was sold to Company B in late 2019. Royalty payments ceased at the time. The individual who owned the royalty was ill around this time and passed in mid 2020 so the missing royalty wasn’t noticed initially. This person has a surviving spouse who is still alive and their probated will says everything goes to this surviving spouse. Company A can confirm that the royalty interest was intact when the lease was sold by them to Company B.
In spring of 2024 I started to look into this missing royalty to see if the lease was still operational or if it hasn’t been producing. I used to be an operator in OK so I know how to research information. I confirmed that there was a 1073 in 2019 transferring the lease from company A to Company B. I confirmed Company B is still the listed operator of the lease. I confirmed the lease was still operational and selling gas.
I contacted Company B about the royalty in May and they were unable to find anything. I sent them the biographical information, lease information, statements from Company A when they had the lease, etc. Contact was sporadic and sometimes I would send 2-3 followup emails over a month before I would get them to reengage. I finally received an email saying that their landman looked into it and “the interest is currently listed under the incorrect owner’s name due to an error during the data migration”. They have requested and we sent them the will/probate docs and they are putting under the living spouse’s name. I asked in my second to last email about an accounting of the royalty payments from the acquisition in 2019 until now but in their last email response they didn’t address that topic. I have asked again for an accounting in my email today so we’ll see if I get that information.
I assume that since it was the operator’s error/negligance, my relative’s estate and/or surviving spouse is entitled to the missing royalty payments from the operator(pretty sure the operator handles the royalty payments) and maybe interest as well? Is there a loopback period in the law or anything that might limit that lookback to a certain period of years? I believe we’re talking about over $1,000 in back royalty payments owed but less than $10,000. But until we have that accounting we won’t know. I wanted to see if anyone knows what the law says on this issue in case the operator tells us they’re not paying anything prior to talking to an attorney (if it comes to that).