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House Bill 1822 |
House Author: Solomons et al. |
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Effective: 9-1-09 |
Senate Sponsor: Fraser |
House Bill 1822 amends the Utilities Code to require rules of the Public Utility Commission of Texas (PUC) relating to customer awareness to include a list of defined terms common to the telecommunications and electricity industries. The rules must require that applicable terms be labeled uniformly on each retail bill sent to a customer by a certificated telecommunications utility, retail electric provider, or electric utility to facilitate consumer understanding of relevant billing elements. The bill makes conforming changes to provisions regarding rules on customer choice and sets a December 1, 2009, deadline for rules adoption. The bill entitles all buyers of telecommunications and retail electric services to bills that use the defined terms. It authorizes a service provider, retail electric provider, or billing agent to submit charges for a new product or service to be billed on a customer's telephone or retail electric bill only if, in addition to other requirements, the provider or agent uses defined terms on the customer's bill as required.
House Bill 1822 requires a retail electric provider to provide a residential customer who has a fixed rate product with at least one written notice of the date the fixed rate product will expire and sets requirements for that notice. The bill requires such a provider to include on each billing statement the end date of the fixed rate product.