WSR 15-23-102 PROPOSED RULES UTILITIES AND TRANSPORTATION
COMMISSION
[Docket U-144155—Filed November 18, 2015, 9:03 a.m.]
Original Notice.
Preproposal statement of inquiry was filed as WSR 15-18-121.
Title of Rule and Other Identifying Information: WAC 480-90-178, Gas companies—Operations—Billing requirements and payment date and WAC 480-100-178, Electric companies—Operations—Billing requirements and payment date.
Modify existing rules in chapter 480-90 WAC (gas companies) and chapter 480-100 WAC (electric companies) to address corrected billing issues resulting from billing errors, inaccurate energy usage metering, or unidentified energy usage, which results in corrected billing of electric and natural gas customers. The proposed rules address key concerns of both the companies and commission staff regarding reducing the length of corrected bills while recognizing: (1) Equipment breaks; (2) some customers do not notify the company immediately upon moving in; and (3) companies may not have complete control over how quickly these issues can be identified without significantly increasing costs that would ultimately be borne by all ratepayers.
Hearing Location(s): Commission Hearing Room 206, Second Floor, Richard Hemstad Building, 1300 South Evergreen Park Drive S.W., Olympia, WA 98504-7250, on January 21, 2016, at 1:30 p.m.
Date of Intended Adoption: January 21, 2016.
Submit Written Comments to: Washington Utilities and Transportation Commission, 1300 South Evergreen Park Drive S.W., P.O. Box 47250, Olympia, WA 98504-7250, e-mail records@utc.wa.gov, fax (360) 586-1150, by December 21, 2015. Please include: "Docket U-144155" in your comments.
Assistance for Persons with Disabilities: Contact Debbie Aguilar by January 7, 2016, TTY (360) 586-8203 or (360) 664-1132.
Purpose of the Proposal and Its Anticipated Effects, Including Any Changes in Existing Rules: The purpose of this rule making is to limit the period of time for which a regulated utility may issue a corrected bill. Large retroactive bills have a significant impact on customers, but large retroactive bills could present a particular hardship for low-income and fixed income customers.
The commission is responsible for protecting consumers by ensuring that investor-owned utility services are fairly priced, available, and accurate. Consumers should receive timely and accurate bills each month. It is reasonable to expect utilities to identify and correct bills for billing errors, stopped and slowed meters, as well as unidentified energy usage within a reasonable time frame. Initial data provided by the utilities indicate that customers are continuing to receive corrected bills for periods in excess of six months, and in some cases, more than twelve and twenty-four months.
Responses to the commission's preproposal inquiry indicate that the revised rules would be beneficial and in the public interest because they would establish common standards for all regulated energy utilities. The proposed rules also provide guidance on a utility's responsibilities to develop and maintain procedures for identifying and repairing or replacing meters that are not functioning correctly and identifying meter usage from unidentified usage meters. Finally, the proposed rules provide guidance to regulated energy utilities about the information they must communicate to customers to explain the reason for the corrected bill.
Reasons Supporting Proposal: See above.
Rule is not necessitated by federal law, federal or state court decision.
Name of Proponent: Washington utilities and transportation commission, governmental.
Name of Agency Personnel Responsible for Drafting: Roger Kouchi, 1300 South Evergreen Park Drive S.W., Olympia, WA 98504, (360) 664-1101; Implementation and Enforcement: Steven V. King, 1300 South Evergreen Park Drive S.W., Olympia, WA 98504, (360) 664-1115.
No small business economic impact statement has been prepared under chapter 19.85 RCW. The proposed rules require investor-owned utilities, none of which qualify as a small business, to correct billing errors within a reasonable time frame. Because the proposed rules will not increase costs to small businesses, a small business economic impact statement is not required under RCW 19.85.030(1).
A cost-benefit analysis is not required under RCW 34.05.328. The commission is not an agency to which RCW 34.05.328 applies. The proposed rules are not significant legislative rules of the sort referenced in RCW 34.05.328(5).
November 18, 2015
Steven V. King
Executive Director
and Secretary
AMENDATORY SECTION (Amending WSR 11-06-032, filed 2/25/11, effective 3/28/11)
WAC 480-90-178 Billing requirements and payment date.
(1) Customer bills must:
(a) Be issued at intervals not to exceed two one-month billing cycles, unless the utility can show good cause for delaying the issuance of the bill. The utility must be able to show good cause if requested by the commission;
(b) Show the total amount due and payable;
(c) Show the date the bill becomes delinquent if not paid;
(d) Show the utility's business address, business hours, and toll-free telephone number and emergency telephone number by which a customer may contact the utility;
(e) Show the current and previous meter readings, the current read date, and the total amount of therms used;
(f) Show the amount of therms used for each billing rate, the applicable billing rates per therm, the basic charge or minimum bill;
(g) Show the amount of any municipal tax surcharges or their respective percentage rates;
(h) Clearly identify when a bill has been prorated. A prorated bill must be issued when service is provided for a fraction of the billing period. Unless otherwise specified in the utility's tariff, the charge must be prorated in the following manner:
(i) Flat-rate service must be prorated on the basis of the proportionate part of the period that service was rendered;
(ii) Metered service must be billed for the amount metered. The basic or minimum charge must be billed in full;
(i) Clearly identify when a bill is based on an estimation.
(i) A utility must detail its method(s) for estimating customer bills in its tariff;
(ii) The utility may not estimate for more than four consecutive months unless the cause of the estimation is inclement weather, terrain, or a previous arrangement with the customer; and
(j) Clearly identify determination of maximum demand. A utility providing service to any customer on a demand basis must detail in its filed tariff the method of applying charges and of ascertaining the demand.
(2) The minimum time allowed for payment after the bill's mailing date must be fifteen days, if mailed from within the states of Washington, Oregon, or Idaho, or eighteen days if mailed from outside the states of Washington, Oregon, and Idaho.
(3) The utility must allow a customer to change a designated payment-due date when the customer has a satisfactory reason for the change. A satisfactory reason may include, but is not limited to, adjustment of a designated payment-due date to parallel receipt of income. The preferred payment date must be prior to the next billing date.
(4) With the consent of the customer, a utility may provide billings in electronic form if the bill meets all the requirements for the use of electronic information in this chapter. The utility must maintain a record of the consent as a part of the customer's account record, and the customer may change from electronic to printed billing upon request, as provided in this chapter. The utility must complete the change within two billing cycles of the request.
(5) Corrected bills:
(a) Upon discovery of an underbilling or overbilling resulting from a meter failure, meter malfunction, meter with unassigned energy usage, or any other billing error, a utility must issue the customer a corrected bill to recover or refund billed amounts. The utility must use the rate schedule in effect at the time of each affected billing period covered by the corrected bill. The utility must issue the corrected bill within sixty days from the date the utility discovered the underbilling or overbilling. However, except as provided for in subsection (7) of this section, when a utility discovers that it has underbilled a customer, it may not seek to collect for any period greater than six months from the date the error occurred.
(b) For the purposes of this subsection:
(i) A meter failure or malfunction is defined as: A mechanical malfunction or failure that prevents the meter or any ancillary data collection or transmission device from registering or transmitting the actual amount of energy used. A meter failure or malfunction includes, but is not limited to, a stopped meter, a meter that is faster or slower than the metering tolerance specified in WAC 480-90-338, or an erratic meter.
(ii) For the purpose of this rule, unassigned energy usage meter is defined as a meter that is installed at a valid service address and accurately records energy usage during a period of time where there was no active gas service account at that premises.
(iii) For the purpose of this rule, a billing error is defined as any error which results in incorrect charges.
(c) A utility must develop and maintain procedures to identify and repair or replace meters not functioning correctly and identify meter usage from unassigned usage meters. These procedures shall address steps taken to prevent corrected bills for underbilling errors that exceed six months in duration. The initial plan delineating the procedures must be filed with the commission by May 1, 2016. If the utility makes subsequent changes to the plan, the modified plan must be filed with the commission within thirty days of any changes. The plan must include, at a minimum:
(i) Procedures to prevent billing errors resulting from, but not limited to, billing errors due to incorrect prorated bills, mislabeled meter bases, incorrectly installed meters, incorrect billing rate schedules, or incorrect billing multipliers.
(ii) Procedures for investigating meter errors including, but not limited to, those created by stopped, slowed, and erratic usage meters.
(iii) Procedures for investigating meter usage from unidentified usage meters.
(6) For the purpose of this rule, a corrected bill may take the form of a newly issued bill or may be reflected as a line item adjustment on a subsequent monthly bill. When a corrected bill is issued, the utility must provide the following information on the corrected bill, in a bill insert, letter, or any combination of methods that clearly explains all the information required to be sent to the customer:
(a) The reason for the bill correction;
(b) A breakdown of the bill correction for each month included in the corrected bill;
(c) The total amount of the bill correction that is due and payable;
(d) The time period covered by the bill correction;
(e) The actions taken to resolve the cause of the bill correction; and
(f) When issuing a corrected bill for underbilling, an explanation of the availability of payment arrangements in accordance with WAC 480-90-138(1) Payment arrangements.
(7) Corrected bills issued for the following purposes are exempt from the provisions of subsection (5)(a) of this section:
(a) Meter failure or malfunction or billing error related to customer tampering with the utility's property, use of the utility's service through an illegal connection, or the customer fraudulently obtaining service.
(b) An estimated meter read made in accordance with subsection (1)(i) of this section is not considered a meter failure or malfunction or a billing error. A bill true-up based on an actual meter reading after one or more estimated bills is not considered a corrected bill for purposes of subsection (5)(a) of this section.
AMENDATORY SECTION (Amending WSR 11-06-032, filed 2/25/11, effective 3/28/11)
WAC 480-100-178 Billing requirements and payment date.
(1) Customer bills must:
(a) Be issued at intervals not to exceed two one-month billing cycles, unless the utility can show good cause for delaying the issuance of the bill. The utility must be able to show good cause if requested by the commission;
(b) Show the total amount due and payable;
(c) Show the date the bill becomes delinquent if not paid;
(d) Show the utility's business address, business hours, and a toll-free telephone number and an emergency telephone number by which a customer may contact the utility;
(e) Show the current and previous meter readings, the current read date, and the total amount of kilowatt hours used;
(f) Show the amount of kilowatt hours used for each billing rate, the applicable billing rates per kilowatt hour, the basic charge or minimum bill;
(g) Show the amount of any municipal tax surcharges or their respective percentage rates;
(h) Clearly identify when a bill has been prorated. A prorated bill must be issued when service is provided for a fraction of the billing period. Unless otherwise specified in the utility's tariff, the charge must be prorated in the following manner:
(i) Flat-rate service must be prorated on the basis of the proportionate part of the period the service was rendered;
(ii) Metered service must be billed for the amount metered. The basic or minimum charge must be billed in full.
(i) Clearly identify when a bill is based on an estimation.
(i) The utility must detail its method(s) for estimating customer bills in its tariff;
(ii) The utility may not estimate for more than four consecutive months, unless the cause of the estimation is inclement weather, terrain, or a previous arrangement with the customer;
(j) Clearly identify determination of maximum demand. A utility providing service to any customer on a demand basis must detail in its filed tariff the method of applying charges and of ascertaining the demand.
(2) The minimum time allowed for payment after the bill's mailing date must be fifteen days, if mailed from within the states of Washington, Oregon, or Idaho, or eighteen days if mailed from outside the states of Washington, Oregon, and Idaho.
(3) The utility must allow a customer to change a designated payment-due date when the customer has a satisfactory reason for the change. A satisfactory reason may include, but is not limited to, adjustment of a designated payment-due date to parallel receipt of income. The preferred payment date must be prior to the next billing date.
(4) With the consent of the customer, a utility may provide billings in electronic form if the bill meets all the requirements for the use of electronic information in this chapter. The utility must maintain a record of the consent as a part of the customer's account record, and the customer may change from electronic to printed billing upon request, as provided in this chapter. The utility must complete the change within two billing cycles of the request.
(5) Corrected bills:
(a) Upon discovery of an underbilling or overbilling resulting from a meter failure, meter malfunction, meter with unassigned energy usage, or any other billing error, a utility must issue the customer a corrected bill to recover or refund billed amounts. The utility must use the rate schedule in effect at the time of each affected billing period covered by the corrected bill. The utility must issue the corrected bill within sixty days from the date the utility discovered the underbilling or overbilling. However, except as provided for in subsection (7) of this section, when a utility discovers that it has underbilled a customer, it may not seek to collect for any period greater than six months from the date the error occurred.
(b) For the purposes of this subsection:
(i) A meter failure or malfunction is defined as: A mechanical malfunction or failure that prevents the meter or any ancillary data collection or transmission device from registering or transmitting the actual amount of energy used. A meter failure or malfunction includes, but is not limited to, a stopped meter, a meter that is faster or slower than the metering tolerance specified in WAC 480-100-338, or an erratic meter.
(ii) For the purpose of this rule, unassigned energy usage meter is defined as a meter that is installed at a valid service address and accurately records energy usage during a period of time where there was no active electric service account at that premises.
(iii) For the purpose of this rule, a billing error is defined as any error which results in incorrect charges.
(c) A utility must develop and maintain procedures to identify and repair or replace meters not functioning correctly and identify meter usage from unassigned usage meters. These procedures shall address steps taken to prevent corrected bills for underbilling errors that exceed six months in duration. The initial plan delineating the procedures must be filed with the commission by May 1, 2016. If the utility makes subsequent changes to the plan, the modified plan must be filed with the commission within thirty days of any changes. The plan must include, at a minimum:
(i) Procedures to prevent billing errors resulting from, but not limited to, billing errors due to incorrect prorated bills, mislabeled meter bases, incorrectly installed meters, incorrect billing rate schedules, or incorrect billing multipliers.
(ii) Procedures for investigating meter errors including, but not limited to, those created by stopped, slowed, and erratic usage meters.
(iii) Procedures for investigating meter usage from unidentified usage meters.
(6) For the purpose of this rule, a corrected bill may take the form of a newly issued bill or may be reflected as a line item adjustment on a subsequent monthly bill. When a corrected bill is issued, the utility must provide the following information on the corrected bill, in a bill insert, letter, or any combination of methods that clearly explains all the information required to be sent to the customer:
(a) The reason for the bill correction;
(b) A breakdown of the bill correction for each month included in the corrected bill;
(c) The total amount of the bill correction that is due and payable;
(d) The time period covered by the bill correction;
(e) The actions taken to resolve the cause of the bill correction; and
(f) When issuing a corrected bill for underbilling, an explanation of the availability of payment arrangements in accordance with WAC 480-100-138(1) Payment arrangements.
(7) Corrected bills issued for the following purposes are exempt from the provisions of subsection (5)(a) of this section:
(a) Meter failure or malfunction or billing error related to customer tampering with the utility's property, use of the utility's service through an illegal connection, or the customer fraudulently obtaining service.
(b) An estimated meter read made in accordance with subsection (1)(i) of this section is not considered a meter failure or malfunction or a billing error. A bill true-up based on an actual meter reading after one or more estimated bills is not considered a corrected bill for purposes of subsection (5)(a) of this section.
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