Under West Virginia Code §24-2-11, the "Rule of 20" refers to the legal threshold required to elevate a formal complaint to the official status of a "substantial protest".
When a petition against an action—such as a proposed rate hike—gathers 20 or more signatures from "aggrieved customers," it officially achieves this upgraded status. For the signatures to count toward this 20-person threshold, they must come strictly from actual local ratepayers who pay the relevant fees or use the service in question.
Reaching this 20-signature benchmark is highly significant because it forces the West Virginia Public Service Commission (PSC) to take the complaint more seriously. Specifically, achieving a "substantial protest" status often triggers a mandatory decision timeline and can potentially force the state to hold a local public hearing to investigate the issue directly.
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