Production ongoing; no communication from operator

My wife and I have NPMI in a several sections in Glasscock Co, TX. In one of them, there are a few low-producing vertical wells, operated by XTO, who holds the lease, and we’re in pay status for those.

In the last 14 months we noticed new permits for this section, for horizontals. The operator was to be Energen, who has been purchased by Diamondback Energy.

We’ve reached out to both XTO and Diamondback several times, via email and phone, to get more information about the status of these permits, but they do not respond to our communication; they don’t even send a “read” request on the email. We are friends with a man who also owns NPMI in this same section. He has the same problem. He was successful in one communication effort with Diamondback, but all they would do is confirm that the horizontals are already producing. Neither XTO nor Diamondback will answer questions about when division orders may be expected, or who would be sending them out.

We understand that there may be a delay in sending the division orders; in one other case, it took 2 years! But we are really stumped at the complete lack of response to our inquiries; we have never had a lease holder/operator fail to respond to an inquiry about production in a section where our ownership has already been established and in which we are in pay status.

Does anyone have any thoughts about this situation? Should we be alarmed, or just wait a bit longer for communication from either of them. Is there any other kind of action we could take for correspondence to encourage a response? At this point, we would just like for someone to acknowledge our communication and respond to our questions about the new development. Thoughts/suggestions are welcome; thanks.

patience is a virtue. Send them a certified letter.

Thank you, Todd; good suggestion. We were just wondering this morning if we were going to have to get an attorney to send an inquiry. This would be a good first step. I think we’ll try that.

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