Committed Lines of Credit

9 Months Ended

Sep. 30, 2014

Short-term Debt [Abstract]

Committed Lines of Credit

COMMITTED LINES OF CREDIT

Avista Corp.

Avista Corp. has a committed line of credit with various financial institutions in the total amount of $400.0 million. In April 2014, the Company amended this committed line of credit agreement to extend the expiration date to April 2019. The amendment also provides the Company the option to request an extension for an additional one or two years beyond April 2019, provided, 1) there are no default events prior to the requested extension, and 2) the remaining term of agreement, including the requested extension period, does not exceed five years. The amendment did not change the amount of the committed line of credit.

The committed line of credit is secured by non-transferable First Mortgage Bonds of the Company issued to the agent bank that would only become due and payable in the event, and then only to the extent, that the Company defaults on its obligations under the committed line of credit.

The committed line of credit agreement contains customary covenants and default provisions. The credit agreement has a covenant which does not permit the ratio of “consolidated total debt” to “consolidated total capitalization” of Avista Corp. to be greater than 65 percent at any time. As of September 30, 2014, the Company was in compliance with this covenant.

Balances outstanding and interest rates of borrowings (excluding letters of credit) under the Company’s revolving committed lines of credit were as follows as of September 30, 2014 and December 31, 2013 (dollars in thousands):

	September 30,			December 31,
	2014			2013
Borrowings outstanding at end of period	$	35,000		$	171,000
Letters of credit outstanding at end of period	$	45,614		$	27,434
Average interest rate on borrowings at end of period	0.92		%	1.02		%

As of September 30, 2014 the borrowings outstanding under Avista Corp.'s committed line of credit were classified as short-term borrowings on the Condensed Consolidated Balance Sheet.

AEL&P

AEL&P has a committed line of credit in the amount of $14.5 million with an expiration date of June 2015. As of September 30, 2014, there were no borrowings outstanding under this committed line of credit. Under the terms of the agreement, interest on outstanding borrowings accrues at 0.25 percent below the prime rate with a floor of 4 percent. In addition, a fee of 0.45 percent accrues on the unadvanced portion of the line of credit.

Ecova

Ecova had a $125.0 million committed line of credit agreement with various financial institutions that had an expiration date of July 2017. The credit agreement was secured by all of Ecova's assets excluding investments and funds held for clients. Since Ecova was disposed of as of June 30, 2014, the balance of this credit agreement is no longer on the balance sheet as of September 30, 2014.

The balance outstanding and interest rate of borrowings under Ecova’s credit agreement were as follows as of December 31, 2013 (dollars in thousands):

	December 31,
	2013
Borrowings outstanding at end of period	$	46,000
Average interest rate on borrowings at end of period	2.17		%

As of December 31, 2013 the borrowings outstanding under Ecova's committed line of credit were classified as long-term borrowings under committed line of credit on the Condensed Consolidated Balance Sheet.