Here’s why you might get a $50 or $120 check in the mail from the AG

You could be getting a $50 or $120 check in the mail for overpaying for chicken or tuna.

The Attorney General’s Office expects to send more than 400,000 checks to Washington households by the end of the year because the state has settled a series of price-fixing lawsuits with chicken and tuna producers.

You don’t need to do anything or track down any ancient receipts to get a check. But only people below a certain income qualify. The idea is to provide restitution to Washingtonians who could least afford the higher prices.

Households living at 175% or less of the federal poverty level — that figure varies depending on how big your household is, but, for example, means earnings of $52,500 or less for a family of four — can expect to get a check in the mail.

Households with one person in them will get $50, while households with two or more people will get $120. About 1 in 6 Washingtonians live in households eligible for the restitution check, Attorney General Bob Ferguson said.

Those checks total about $38.9 million, and the first batch went out Tuesday.

The state is holding back an additional $1.7 million from settlements for people who are eligible for a check in case they do not receive one. If you don’t receive a check by the end of the year, and qualify because of your income level, you can go to refundcheck.atg.wa.gov to file a claim.

In 2021, Washington sued 19 chicken producers for violating the state’s antitrust laws, asserting the producers conspired to “inflate and manipulate prices, rig contract bids, illegally exchange information and coordinate industry supply reductions to maximize profits,” according to the Attorney General’s Office.

Those 19 producers account for 95% of broiler chickens — chickens grown for eating — sold in the U.S.

Washington has settled with 15 of the companies for $35.5 million.

The case against the remaining three chicken producers is scheduled to go to trial next year. One of the companies is the result of a merger between what were two separate companies when the lawsuit was filed.

In 2020, Washington sued two tuna companies and the former CEO of a third after executives at the three companies schemed to raise prices. Washington has received $5.1 million as a result of the tuna cases.

“What’s so maddening about the conduct of these companies is the reason that they engaged in this price-fixing conspiracy was greed,” Ferguson said in a news conference Wednesday. “They wanted to make more money.”