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Bill Negatively Impacting Retail Choice Reported Favorably, Referred To New Committee
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Several pending Massachusetts bills concerning retail energy and other energy matters have been repackaged as new H.4744, which has been reported favorably from the committee on Telecommunications, Utilities and Energy, and referred to the committee on House Ways and Means
H.4744 include various retail market reforms and other changes also included in other bills, such as H.4144
Among other things, H.4744 would strike the current requirement that electricity default service shall be procured via "competitive bidding," instead providing that default service shall be procured through, "competitive bidding or through such other process
approved by the department [DPU], including procurements of varying lengths and in combination with
other distribution companies."
H.4744 would also establish a process -- not specifically for default service but also not explicitly separate from default service -- for utilities to engage in long-term contracting, and would authorize such utility contracts if such, "contributes to the mitigation of winter electricity price spikes," or, "provides energy price-suppression benefits," among other benefits enumerated in the bill
H.4744 is not explicit or prescriptive as to the disposition of any products, and cost recovery for such, under utility long-term contracting, aside from the RPS provision noted at the end of this story
However, the bill would provide that the DPU "may" require, "a separate mechanism for recovering certain charges, to be
itemized separately on a customer bill, including, but not limited to, those in connection with the
wholesale electric markets as administered by ISO New England, Inc. or federal tariffs on
imports to such market."
The bill would require that residential electricity basic service rates change no less than once every six months, excluding TOU rates and the current monthly variable option
H.4744 would empower the DPU to promulgate rules and regulations
necessary to carry out the provisions of the bill related to default service, including the procedure for default service
procurement and, "governing a customer's ability to return to the default service after choosing
retail access from a non-utility affiliated generation company."
H.4744 would authorize the utilities to seek DPU approval for supplier-specific purchase of receivables discount rates, based on the supplier’s amount of uncollectible bills or percentage of customers in
arrears, relative to the average of the uncollectible bills for the participating classes of the electric
distribution company or the average number of customers in arrears
H.4744 would require a $5 million bond for, "Each energy marketer or other supplier that applies for a retail license."
"The bond shall be
conditioned upon the full and faithful performance of all duties and obligations of the applicant
as a retail supplier," H.4744 states
Notably, under existing statute, "supplier" is defined as, "a supplier of generation service to retail customers, including power marketers, brokers and marketing affiliates of distribution companies, except that no electric company shall be considered a supplier." [emphasis added]
The term "retail supplier" is not defined in the bill
The term "broker" is not defined under existing statute, nor would H.4744 define broker. The DPU's regulations (not statute) provide that a broker is an entity which, "facilitates or otherwise arranges for the purchase and sale of electricity and related
services to Retail Customers, but does not sell electricity."
The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court has noted that, under statute, "'supplier[s]' are defined to include energy brokers," with the court observing that, "Although the department's regulations distinguish between competitive suppliers and electricity brokers, in that a broker does not own or sell electricity to a consumer and only 'facilitates or otherwise arranges' for its purchase and sale, 220 Code Mass. Regs. § 11.02, a broker is treated as equivalent to a supplier in the broader regulatory scheme." [emphasis added] (Northeast Energy Partners, LLC v. Mahar Regional Sch. Dist., 462 Mass. 687, 971 N.E.2d 258 (2012))
The existing statutory definition of supplier could be read as a broker only being defined as a supplier if the broker is a, "supplier of generation service to retail customers." However, the phrase "including ... brokers" may also be read more broadly as noted above
H.4744 does not narrow the definition of "supplier" nor does the bill explicitly exclude brokers from the $5 million bond (in contrast, as noted below, the bill specifically contemplates a lower annual license fee for brokers versus suppliers)
However, in terms of the intent of the bill's language, it is notable that other provisions in the same section to which brokers would be subject explicitly mention "brokers", and specifically use phrasing such as, "All energy brokers, energy marketers, and suppliers."
The term "broker" is missing from the language concerning the $5 million bond, suggesting an intent that brokers would not be subject to the $5 million bond. However, a clean-up may be needed to achieve such exemption, given the existing broad definition of "supplier" noted above
The bill's application of the $5 million bond requirement to a "supplier" which applies for a "retail license" is not dispositive on the matter, because, for electricity, neither the DPU's distinct "competitive supplier" license nor the DPU's distinct "electricity broker" license is described as a "retail license"
H.4744 would define "energy marketer" to mean, "any entity, firm, partnership, association, private corporation, or other
third-party who contracts with or is otherwise directly engaged and compensated by a supplier to
sell electric generation services, or contracts with and is directly compensated by a third-party
marketer of the supplier to sell electric generation services on behalf of a supplier, that markets,
advertises, or otherwise offers to sell generation service to retail customers that is acting as an agent for a supplier, including, but not limited to, entities engaged in door-to-door,
telemarketing, or tabletop interactions with retail customers."
The bill provides that the term energy marketer shall not include
contractors, agents, or employees engaged in, "incidental activities where compensation is not tied
to customer enrollment."
While the bill states that the $5 million bond is required for such companies that "apply" for a retail license (potentially opening the door for a grandfathering), because the DPU requires annual renewals of licenses, any grandfathering would be temporary, due to the need to apply for a renewed license (with the DPU specifically calling renewal filings "applications")
All brokers, energy marketers, and retail suppliers would be subject to an annual license fee not to exceed $10,000. The fee may be differentiated between energy brokers, energy marketers, and suppliers, H.4744 provides
Under the bill, any energy marketer shall be a legal agent of the supplier, and must receive training "directly" from the supplier in order to engage in selling. This provision does not apply to third-party
brokers or consultants or agents acting on behalf of customers that are compensated by the
customer as part of the customer’s electric contract price.
H.4744 would allow customers to initiate a complaint concerning slamming for up to two years after the notice of a supplier change, compared to the current 30-day time limit
H.4744 would ban retail supplier service to low-income residential electric customers. A municipal aggregation's supplier would not be subject to this provision. Low-income residential customer would mean a customer actively enrolled in an R2
electric rate tariff.
H.4744 would ban automatic renewal from a fixed rate to a variable rate for residential customers
H.4744 would ban residential variable rates, except for, "a rate that adjusts
for seasonal variation more than twice in a single year or a time-of-use rate that establishes
different rates for periods within a single day, or as otherwise approved by the department."
For residential customers, H.4744 would require third-party verification for all in-person sales and telephonic sales
H.4744 would ban residential early termination fees
The bill would require the following for residential green offers:
(1) The supplier discloses to the residential customer in plain language and prior to
enrollment, that the customer will not receive electricity directly from renewable generating units
and that the supplier will acquire and retire renewable energy certificates ("RECs") or other
eligible clean energy attributes in an amount equal to the customer’s usage.
(2) The disclosure identifies the resource type(s) and geographic origin(s) of the RECs to
be retired. If such information is not available at the time of enrollment, the supplier shall
disclose the resource type(s) and geographic origin(s) of RECs retired for a substantially similar
product over the prior twelve (12) months, and provide the specific product’s REC details to the
residential customer within sixty (60) days after the first billing cycle.
(3) The RECs are sourced from any certificate tracking system that assigns unique serial
numbers, records issuance, transfer, and retirement, and prevents double counting.
H.4744 would require retail suppliers to provide notice to the DPU, at least 30 days in advance, of any, "assignment or transfer of their supplier license."
The DPU would be empowered to deny or impose conditions on the transfer of the license
H.4744 would require natural gas utilities to default residential customers to budget
billing, calculated by dividing the twelve-month annual gas usage of
each customer into twelve equal monthly amounts at then-current retail rates to be billed to the
residential customer on the customer’s monthly bill, unless a customer chooses to opt-out of the
default budget billing.
H.4744 includes several distinct provisions requiring the reporting of prices by suppliers, with one of the provisions making such reporting public
Under one provision, suppliers shall report semi-annually
the average of all rates charged for default, low-income, and standard offer
service to each customer class and for each sub-class within the residential class, respectively;
provided, however, that all such rate information shall be
deemed public information, and no such rate information shall be protected as a trade secret,
confidential, competitively sensitive, or other proprietary information pursuant to section 5D of
chapter 25. Each supplier shall report to the DPU detailed and accurate information
including, but not limited to, the following: data regarding number of customers, load served,
amounts billed to customers in dollars, renewable and clean energy attribute certificate
purchases, and supply product offerings. "The department may make such information, or aggregates of such information, available to the public on its website," the bill states
In a separate provision, suppliers shall quarterly, or more frequently, provide to the DPU: (i) a list detailing
each rate the supplier charged to residential retail customers in the last quarter; and (ii) the
number of low-income and non-low-income residential retail customers charged each rate
included in such list by rate class.
For this quarterly reporting, the DPU shall publish average rates charged to
customer classes and the aggregate number of customers served.
However, for this quarterly reporting, the bill provides, "Any information regarding competitive supply that the department makes available to the public
shall be presented only in aggregated or anonymized form and shall not include supplier-specific
pricing, offers, or terms. Supplier-submitted pricing and other commercially-sensitive
information shall be treated as confidential and used solely for regulatory oversight and market
monitoring."
Concerning long-term utility contracts, the DPU may use environmental attribute products from such contracts to reduce the minimum obligations of suppliers who are subject to the clean energy standards
The bill would also require utilities to include plans for virtual power plants in the utilities' required modernization plans
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Bill's $5 Million Bond Requirement For Retail License May Be Read As Including Brokers, With Court Precedent
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November 13, 2025
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Copyright 2025 EnergyChoiceMatters.com
Reporting by Paul Ring • ring@energychoicematters.com
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