BILL NUMBER: S3758            REVISED MEMO 2/19/2019

SPONSOR: PARKER
 
TITLE OF BILL:  An act to amend the public service law, in relation to
services provided to residential customers by energy service companies

 
PURPOSE OR GENERAL IDEA OF BILL:

Prohibits services provided to residential customers by certain energy
service companies.

 
SUMMARY OF SPECIFIC PROVISIONS:

The public service law is amended by adding a new section 54 to read as
follows:
Beginning January first, two thousand twenty, no energy service company
shall execute a new contract for generation services with any individual
residential retail customer. This section shall not apply to any govern-
ment body that aggregates the load of residential retail customers as
part of a community choice aggregation program approved by the commis-
sion.
              

Any violation of this section shall be deemed a deceptive act or prac-
tice and the attorney general is hereby authorized to bring an action
under such article to enforce this section and to obtain civil penal-
ties, injunctive relief, and any other relief awarded pursuant to arti-
cle twentytwo-a.

 
JUSTIFICATION:

According to the Public Service Commission's (PSC) brief in Case
15-M-0127, "approximately two million New York State residential utility
customers who took commodity service from an ESCO collectively paid
almost $1.2 billion more than they would have paid if they purchased
commodity from their distribution utility during the 36-months ending
December 31, 2016. Additionally, small commercial customers paid $136
million more than they would have paid if they instead simply remained
with their default utilities for commodity supply for the same 36-month
period. Combining the residential and small commercial customer classes,
mass market customers were "overcharged" by over $1.3 billion dollars
over this time period. Finally, the data also shows that low-income
customers (a subset of the residential customer mentioned above) who
took commodity service from an ESCO collectively paid in excess of $146
million more than they would have paid if they took commodity supply
from their utility."

To put these numbers in perspective, New Yorkers are overcharged roughly
$1.5 million per day. Recently, Connecticut and Massachusetts have
introduced similar legislation to help protect customers from over-
charges by energy service companies.

 
PRIOR LEGISLATION:

New bill.

 
FISCAL IMPLICATIONS:

Undetermined.

 
EFFECTIVE DATE:
This act shall take effect immediately.