The Commission issued a NOPR to revise its rules on gas marketer billing practices. Rulemaking proposals include: 1) a 20 day (increased from 15 day) grace period for bill payment; 2) requiring that marketer bills be based on actual meter reads but allowing for an estimated bill, for a maximum of two consecutive months, when the utility doesn't make actual meter readings available; 3) increased bill format requirements; 4) retention of billing dispute records for two years; and 5) a billing dispute resolution process. If a marketer issues a bill in violation of the billing rules it must pay, "the consumer $100, plus either $5 per day, accruing from the date the Commission notified the marketer it was investigating the dispute, that the consumer’s billing situation was not rectified or an amount determined by Order of the Commission. A marketer found at a hearing to be in non-compliance with this Commission Rule shall be subject to a fine of $100 per violation." The full text of the NOPR is available on the NEM Website.

NEM filed testimony in the Detroit Edison unbundling proceeding urging the Commission to require DTE to implement embedded cost-based unbundled rates in order to facilitate consumers' ability to make price comparisons with competitive options as well customer migration in general. NEM urged that rates should be unbundled in more detail than simply generation, transmission and distribution, to include information about competitive services such as billing, metering, customer care and enrollment. NEM also urged that the unbundled rate information be made available on customer bills. The full text of NEM's Testimony is available on the NEM Website.

Many thanks to Phil O'Connor of AES NewEnergy and Jennifer Frye of Dickinson Wright for their assistance with this proceeding.

NYSEG and ConEd have submitted draft standby rate filings. NYSEG's filing is applicable to "existing customers, and potential customers, where all or a portion of the customer's electricity is supplied from On-Site Generating facilities that produce electricity primarily to serve that customer's native load, or wholesale generators that operate mainly to produce and sell electricity in the wholesale market." NYSEG's filing provides that: 1) the customer charge will be based on marginal cost; 2) the as-used demand for customers with mandatory interval metering with contract demand of 50kw or more is the maximum metered demand during on-peak hours for each daily occurence, subject to an as-used demand charge, per kilowatt, per day; 3) the as-used demand for customers with demand metering is monthly metered kilowatts, subject to an as-used demand charge per kilowatt; 4) customers with less than 50kw of contract demand that want to be billed on an interval meter rate must install the meter at their own expense; 5) the as-used demand for customers without demand metering and less than 50kw of connected load is monthly metered kilowatt-hours, subject to an as-used demand charge, per kilowatt-hour; 6) a contract demand charge will be assessed, and contract demand is the customer's maximum load supplied by all sources. The full text of NYSEG's Standby Rate Filing and Exhibit A is available on the NEM Website.

ConEd's standby rate filing is applicable to delivery of power and energy, "to replace or supplement power and energy ordinarily generated by an on-site generator and for 'station use' by a wholesale generator." The filing includes an interconnection charge, transmission contract demand charge, distribution contract demand charge, customer charge, as-used transmission demand charge and an as-used distribution demand charge. The full text of ConEd's filing will be posted on the NEM Website when made available electronically.

A PJM Market Monitoring Unit report concluded that an entity, later identified as PPL Energy, raised the price of ICAP during the period of January-April 2001 "above the competitive level." The Commission initiated an investigation into the PJM ICAP market subsequent to the PJM report. The Commission has concluded that, "anticompetitive or discriminatory conduct including the unlawful exercise of market power and the threat of future recurrences of similar conduct is preventing the retail customers in this Commonwealth from obtaining the benefits of a properly functioning and workable competitive retail electricity market." The Commission referred the matter to the state Attorney General, the U.S. Department of Justice, and FERC. The Commission suggests that FERC utilize a standard condition in every market-based rate authorization that forbids anticompetitive behavior, the exercise of market power or the misuse and abuse or gaming of tariffed or non-tariffed rules or regulations. The Commission also suggested that FERC strengthen the authority of RTO market monitors. The full texts of the Investigation Report, Statement of Chairman Thomas and Statement of Commissioner Wilson are available on the NEM Website.

Commission Staff has begun an effort to examine the competitive provision of default service. Staff has requested comments on: 1) supplier interest in providing competitive default service; 2) the technical, regulatory and legal barriers to competitive provision of default service; 3) the desirability and feasability of utilizing a competitive bidding process and what procedures should be used to facilitate such a process; and 4) Commission or legislative action that could be taken to improve competitive provision of default service. Comments are due August 15, 2002, and a follow-up meeting will be held on October 4, 2002, at 10AM in the Commission's 3rd floor conference room. Members should submit their comments to headquarters ASAP.

Staff is examining revisions to the calculation of projected market prices and resulting wires charges. Staff has requested comments on potential changes to the methods applicable to the utilities' July 1, 2002, filings. Comments may include conceptual changes or additional sources of data for computing the projected market prices. Comments are due July 17, 2002, and an informal meeting will be held on July 24, 2002, at 9:30AM in the Commission's 3rd floor training room. Members should forward their comments to headquarters ASAP.