RESA: Illinois Staff Draft Muni Aggregation Rule "Tilts the Playing Field" in Favor of Aggregation Suppliers

Proposed rules relating to various municipal aggregation issues filed by Illinois Commerce Commission Staff, "heavily tilts the playing field in favor of those Retail Electric Suppliers ('RES') who emphasize municipal aggregation as their preferred marketing channel, at the expense of those RESs employing direct methods requiring affirmative action on the part of the customer," the Retail Energy Supply Association said in comments to the ICC.

"[N]owhere in the Illinois Power Agency Act does it state that municipal aggregation shall be the preferred way for residential and small commercial customers to reap the benefits of retail competition," RESA said.

"In particular, RESA objects to provisions of the Staff's Draft that would facilitate the 'slamming' of or allow an Aggregation Supplier to market to Non-Aggregation Customers, defined as those customers being served by an incumbent RES."

Among other things, RESA is referencing Staff's proposal that the utility be obligated to provide all customer account numbers to a Governmental Aggregator, including account numbers of hourly service customers and customers already shopping with a competitive supplier.

With this customer information in hand, Staff's proposal further allows the Governmental Aggregator to "inform" (or market to) customers currently on competitive supply about the aggregation program without automatically including those customers in the aggregation program.

"Staff's Draft will make it very difficult for RESs using direct marketing channels to be competitive because the Aggregation Suppliers will be given information that puts them at a competitive advantage," RESA said.

"Indeed, Staff's Draft is based on Ohio's municipal aggregation rules. However, Ohio is a state where there is not a robust market for residential and small commercial customers because municipal aggregation programs have become the main marketing channel. Moreover, in Northern Ohio, the vast majority of switching in the municipal aggregation programs was to utility affiliates in the utility's service territory," RESA said.

RESA recommended changes to Staff's draft such that customer information of existing competitive supply customers will not be provided to the governmental aggregator

Docket No. 12-0456