District of Columbia

Restructuring Overview  |  Public Benefits  |  Restructuring Resources  |  Consumer Protection

Electric
Overview

• The City Council passed Bill 13-284 in December 1999. After approval by the Mayor and the Financial Responsibility and Management Assistance Authority, and a 30-day period of congressional review, the bill became D.C. Law 13-107, effective May 9, 2000. The act provides customer choice beginning January 1, 2002, with all customers free to choose within two years. The Commission will determine the schedule for phasing-in customer choice and can delay the initial implementation date for up to one year. Rates are capped at the December 31, 1999 level beginning on the implementation date and ending January 1, 2005.

Choice Status

• As of May 2003, 22,253 (about 11.2%) of 197,929 residential customers were participating in the pilot choice program.

Natural Gas
Overview

• Beginning in January 1999, under a pilot program known as the Residential Customer Choice Pilot Program, customers in the District of Columbia could choose to buy their natural gas from suppliers other than Washington Gas. The success of the program led Washington Gas to ask the Public Service Commission of the District of Columbia to remove the program's "pilot" status. The Commission granted that request on February 21, 2001, and the District of Columbia Customer Choice Program has been implemented on a full-scale basis.

Choice Status

• As of July 2003, 23,521 (about 17%) of 135,820 residential customers were participating in the pilot choice program.

Choice education
Customer Choice: Status of Competition
www.dcpsc.org/ci/cch/cch.html
This state website includes a link that allows residential customers to calculate how much they would save by using any particular energy supplier. The site also explains deregulation in the District of Columbia and includes a sample bill from a competitive energy supplier.

Suppliers
Elec: www.dcpsc.org/ci/cch/elec/aesp.pdf
Gas: www.washgas.com/library/residential/customer_choice/

Public Benefits

The District of Columbia's restructuring plan, approved by Congress and the District government, mandates universal service, energy efficiency, and renewable energy programs and calls for a Reliable Energy Trust Fund to fund these programs through application of a non-bypassable charge on electric bills, expected to raise about $8 million annually. The local district government has the authority to decide how to allocate the fund among energy efficiency, renewable energy and low-income programs. (Click here for details on the state’s low-income energy and general residential energy programs.)

Aggregation - buying coops

• The District of Columbia Public Service Commission approved opt-in municipal aggregation in July 2002 as part of its electric competition program. The opt-in approach allows all participants to voluntarily choose to join the aggregated pool. During its deliberations, the PSC rejected the opt-out program, which would consolidate all residential loads unless an individual customer chooses not to be part of the pool. The commission decided that it could be more costly to inform customers that the choice of provider will be made on their behalf rather than simply adding municipal aggregation to the existing list of alternate electricity providers.
• The Mayor may develop and administer a municipal aggregation program for the purchase of electricity supply by DC ratepayers. The Mayor and Public Service Commission shall issue regulations governing municipal aggregation programs.
• The Office of the People’s Counsel must assist any person seeking to implement a customer-based aggregation program. Assistance includes help in understanding the technical and economic issues involved in purchasing electricity supply and supply services. The PSC may adopt reasonable regulations for such programs.
• Allegheny has successfully marketed to aggregated residential customers in Pennsylvania and the DC PSC is encouraging aggregation. Further, the DC Office of Energy will aggregate low-income customers.

State Restructuring Resources

Consumer Protection

• Residential electric or natural gas service cannot be disconnected for nonpayment when the National Weather Service forecasts that the temperature of that location will be 32° F or below for that calendar day.
• Utilities must delay disconnection of residential service for up to 21 days if the customer provides a physician’s certificate or notice from a public health official stating that disconnection would be detrimental to the health and safety of the customer or permanent household resident; renewal of the certificate or notice may delay disconnection for an additional 21 days. The customer is also required to enter into a deferred payment plan.
• Residential utility service may be terminated for nonpayment of a delinquent account, failure to post a cash security deposit or guarantee of payment, and failure to comply with a deferred payment plan.
• A utility cannot terminate residential service unless a written termination notice has been sent to the customer by first class mail at least 15 days before the proposed termination.
• A utility cannot terminate service when a dispute involving the account in question has been docketed at the Commission, provided that payments are made for amounts not in dispute.

Customer service

• Competitive electric suppliers must establish prompt and efficient procedures to address customer inquiries and complaints; set up toll-free numbers and staffing to handle customers’ calls; make reasonable efforts to ensure non-English speaking customers are assisted; and create a mechanism to make prompt adjustments to customer bills.

Deposits/fees

• Residential customer deposits are limited to the lesser of: $100, or twice the amount of the maximum bill incurred over a 12-month period.

Deferred payments

• A customer may sign a deferred payment plan or agree to a plan over the telephone. In either case, the utility must offer the customer a copy of the agreement, and inform a customer of the right to resort to the Commission for resolution of any dispute.
• A utility must put in writing every deferred payment plan involving over $50. This plan must be kept on file by the utility until it is performed or, if defaulted, for 60 days from the date of default.

Right to cancel

• Residential customers have 10 days beginning from the date (on the letter or other form of official communication) notifying them of enrollment with their selected electricity supplier.
• PEPCO will send the letter notifying customers of their right to rescind their selection of electricity supplier the next business day following the day that PEPCO receives the EDI enrollment.

Billing and collections

• Electricity suppliers must disclose to customers all available billing options before reaching agreement on a contract for supply.
• Until consolidated electricity supplier billing is available, suppliers must inform customers of their right to select either consolidated bills from PEPCO or separate bills from PEPCO and the electricity supplier.
• As part of the information on electricity bills, suppliers must include:

1. Meter readings - current, prior month’s and differences between the two may be presented in the same place;
2. meter reading date - may be presented in a single place on a consolidated bill;
3. number and kind of units measured;
4. applicable rate schedule taxes and surcharges;
5. notice of potential late payment charges;
6. total due for consolidated bills, show subtotals for PEPCO and electricity supplier portions and a total due;
7. payment due date - if separate bills, then payment dates may differ;
8. estimated bills - distinctive indication if bill is based on estimated meter reading;
9. business address and telephone numbers for billing inquiries;
10. conversion from meter reading units to billing units - show computation;
11. service address - show on first page of bill;
12. mailing address - show on first page of bill;
13. customer name and account number - show on each page if multiple pages;
14. bill payment plans (if applicable);
15. emergency number for PEPCO;
16. required notices -- e.g. Consumer Bill of Rights, legal notices -- may be inserts;
17. next meter reading date;
18. prior bill amount and summary of electricity supplier and/or PEPCO charges;
19. disclosure of previous payment activity;
20. meter number/identifier;
21. number of days in billing cycle;
22. seasonal rate notice;
23. billing period;
24. PSC address and telephone number;
25. address to where payments are sent;
26. to whom the check is payable;
27. the customer’s name on each page of the bill;
28. collection messages pertaining to regulated services;
29. bill step computations;
30. the date the bill was issued; and
31. OPC’s name and phone number.

• For partial payment processing, payments should be made in the following order:

1. PEPCO arrearage amounts;
2. electricity supplier arrearage amounts;
3. PEPCO current amounts; and
4. electricity supplier current amounts.

• Only PEPCO has the authority to disconnect a customer for non-payment of PEPCO regulated service.
• No late payment charge can be levied on amounts, including deferred payment installations, paid by the due date, or on amounts in dispute before the Commission. Amounts paid after the due date may bear a late payment charge of one percent (1%), and an additional late payment charge at the rate of one and one-half percent (1½%) on the remaining unpaid balance per billing month thereafter.

Supplier licensing

• On September 18, 2000, in Order No. 11796, the Commission adopted interim regulations governing licensing requirements for alternative electricity suppliers. On December 18, 2000, the Commission issued Order No. 11862, which specified additional deposit and bonding standards for certifying suppliers. The Commission established the same deposit caps for small commercial and residential customers. Any electricity supplier applicant that intends to, or actually does, accept deposits and/or prepayments from customers must provide a Customer Payments Bond in an initial amount of $50,000. That amount must be periodically adjusted to ensure that it covers the actual amount of deposits and/or prepayments.

Slamming

• "Slamming" is the illegal practice of changing a customer’s service provider without the consumer’s knowledge or consent. Cramming and slamming are strictly prohibited.

Telemarketing

• Electricity suppliers must ask potential customers, at the beginning of any telephone solicitation, if they wish to hear the full solicitation. Independent, third-party verification is required for all telephone contracts made with residential customers, and all telephone contracts must be recorded and preserved for two years from the date of the recording.

• When a customer/utility dispute cannot be resolved, the utility must refer the customer to the Commission for resolution. The PSC's Office of Consumer Services answers inquiries regarding residential utility service and the procedures for resolving disputes, assists in the formal resolution of customer complaints and disputes that haven’t been resolved under the utility's own procedures, and adjudicates customer complaints that cannot be resolved informally.
• When the Office of Consumer Services dockets a matter for resolution, it must notify the utility by telephone, investigate the matter and attempt, through mediation, to resolve it informally. If a matter cannot be resolved informally with Office of Consumer Services’ intervention (for example, by adjustment or deferred payment plan) within three working days, the complainant must be notified in writing and invited to file a formal complaint within 14 days of the date of mailing. The notice must state the availability of assistance and representation by the Office of the People's Counsel and set forth Commission complaint procedures.
• Formal complaints must be in writing and signed by the complainant on a form provided by the Office of Consumer Services. A member of the OCS or anyone else authorized by the consumer may assist in filling out a complaint form. If the complaint needs to be revised, the complainant must be offered assistance to amend the complaint.
• The Office of Consumer Services must advise the affected utility by telephone whenever a formal complaint is filed, and mail a copy to the utility.
• A written response to the complaint must be returned within seven days from the date of the notice, setting forth the utility's position. A copy of the complaint must also be forwarded to any guarantor of the account in controversy.

• A utility cannot discriminate against or penalize a consumer or customer for exercising any right granted by these rules.

• Individual electricity suppliers that procure electricity through contracts which specify the origins of that electricity must disclose the fuel mix of the electricity they sell in the District of Columbia.
• Individual electric suppliers are not at this time required to disclose the fuel mix of the electricity they sell in the District of Columbia, provided that the electricity they procure is through purchases from the spot market or contracts for electricity from unspecified sources.
• The Commission emphasizes that this waiver is temporary, until such time as fuel mix disclosure becomes feasible.

• Electricity suppliers’ advertising to, and solicitation of, customers must meet the following standards:

1. advertisements cannot be false or misleading;
2. information in advertisements must be clear, accurate and supported by the supplier;
3. solicitations to customers must contain all material terms and conditions of the service offered;
4. suppliers may solicit customers in a number of ways, including the Internet;
5. telephone solicitations must convey certain standard information and be conducted during certain hours of the day; and
6. electricity suppliers must maintain and honor their own "do not call list."

• Market participants must obtain customer consent, in writing, prior to release or disclosure of customer information and must retain the customer’s written consent indefinitely.