§ 165.14 - Procedures applicable to the payment of awards.

§ 165.14 Procedures applicable to the payment of awards.

(a) A recipient of a whistleblower award is entitled to payment on the award only to the extent that the monetary sanction upon which the award is based is collected in the Commission judicial or administrative action or in a related action.

(b) Payment of a whistleblower award for a monetary sanction collected in a Commission action or related action shall be made within a reasonable time following the later of:

(1) The date on which the monetary sanction is collected; or

(2) The completion of the appeals process for all whistleblower award claims arising from:

(i) The Notice of Covered Action, in the case of any payment of an award for a monetary sanction collected in a covered judicial or administrative action; or

(ii) The related action, in the case of any payment of an award for a monetary sanction collected in a related action.

(c) If there are insufficient amounts available in the Fund to pay the entire amount of an award payment within a reasonable period of time from the time for payment specified by paragraph (b) of this section, then subject to the following terms, the balance of the payment shall be paid when amounts become available in the Fund, as follows:

(1) Where multiple whistleblowers are owed payments from the Fund based on awards that do not arise from the same Notice of Covered Action (or related action), priority in making these payments will be determined based upon the date that the Final Order of the Commission is made. If two or more of these Final Orders of the Commission are entered on the same date, then those whistleblowers owed payments will be paid on a pro rata basis until sufficient amounts become available in the Fund to pay their entire payments.

(2) Where multiple whistleblowers are owed payments from the Fund based on awards that arise from the same Notice of Covered Action (or related action), they will share the same payment priority and will be paid on a pro rata basis until sufficient amounts become available in the Fund to pay their entire payments.