Liberty Power to Pay $5,000 to Settle Maine Staff Investigation

Liberty Power will pay $5,000 under an agreement approved by the Maine PUC to resolve a Staff investigation.

The payment was offered voluntarily in relation to Liberty Power's use of an unlicensed marketer/broker, and its enrollment of residential and small commercial meters without authority to serve such classes.

As previously reported (6/3), a Staff investigation concluded that Liberty Power had engaged an unlicensed entity to market electricity on its behalf (namely, National Energy Group).

Chapter 305 § 2(C)(3) of the Commission's rules requires competitive suppliers to use reasonable efforts not to conduct business with any entity acting as a competitive electricity provider in Maine without a license from the PUC. The term competitive electricity provider includes, by statute, a marketer, broker, aggregator, or any other entity selling electricity to the public at retail.

According to the PUC, Liberty Power stated that it was not aware of the requirement in the Commission's rules that a marketer shall be licensed prior to engaging in marketing activities in Maine.

Staff's investigation also determined that Liberty Power had enrolled small commercial and residential customers (Liberty said that any customers enrolled with residential meters were enrolled in the name of a business).

Liberty cited an ambiguous statement in the PUC's original licensing order for what the PUC said was an erroneous belief that Liberty held authority to serve small commercial customers. Specifically, as described by the PUC, "[i]n one place the [licensing] order suggested that the authority included small commercial customers, but in the ordering paragraph Liberty's authority was limited to medium and large commercial customers."

The PUC, in approving an agreement between Liberty Power and Staff to resolve the matter, said that the $5,000 payment does not constitute the imposition or payment of an administrative penalty.

Additionally, Liberty Power has agreed to provide any customers which were solicited by National Energy Group, or who are of a class that Liberty was ineligible to serve as of the time of the enrollment, with the ability to cease service with Liberty without any penalty or consequence to the customer.

The PUC said that Liberty Power has cooperated fully in the investigation, and the PUC said that the payment and other measures represent a fair resolution to the matter.

Accordingly, the PUC will close the investigation without adjudicatory proceedings upon receipt of payment.

Separately, the PUC also approved Liberty Power Holdings' application to expand its license to include service to all customer classes, including residential and small commercial customers, at Central Maine Power and Bangor Hydro-Electric.