Makes provisions regarding the payment of utility bills to authorized payment agencies providing that such payment shall be deemed to be a payment to the utility on the date of payment to the agent, requiring written contracts between a utility and its payment agent and review of such contracts by the public service commission.
STATE OF NEW YORK
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9020
IN SENATE
June 14, 2018
___________
Introduced by Sen. COMRIE -- read twice and ordered printed, and when
printed to be committed to the Committee on Rules
AN ACT to amend the public service law, in relation to protecting resi-
dential utility customers who make bill payments to authorized payment
agents, to provide for written contracts between electric corporations
and payment agents, and to provide for public service commission
review of the credit-worthiness of payment agents in certain cases
The People of the State of New York, represented in Senate and Assem-bly, do enact as follows:
1 Section 1. Section 45 of the public service law, as added by chapter
2 713 of the laws of 1981, is amended to read as follows:
3 § 45. Payment agencies. 1. A utility corporation or municipality may
4 permit its customers to pay their bills to [a] an authorized payment
5 agent. The date of payment to any such authorized payment agent shall be
6 regarded as the date of payment to the utility or municipality, and the
7 payment shall be regarded as if it were paid directly to the utility or
8 municipality on such date. Where a customer of such utility or munici-
9 pality has paid a bill to an authorized payment agent on or before a
10 designated due date, no penalty or extra charge shall accrue on such
11 bill for the reason that the payment did not reach the corporation or
12 municipality on or before the designated due date.
13 2. No party shall act as payment or collection agent with respect to
14 more than twenty residential units for the purpose of collecting and
15 remitting to such electric corporation any charges for electric service
16 to such residential units, including but not limited to distribution
17 service, unless such party has a written contract with such electric
18 corporation in compliance with subdivision three of this section. Noth-
19 ing in this subdivision shall be construed to prevent any person from
20 appointing any family member, other volunteer caregiver, or personal
21 business manager as his or her agent for paying utility bills to any
22 utility corporation.
23 3. No electric corporation shall enter into any contract which
24 provides in whole or in part for collecting and remitting to such elec-
25 tric corporation any charges for electric service, including but not
EXPLANATION--Matter in italics (underscored) is new; matter in brackets
[] is old law to be omitted.
LBD09476-01-7
S. 9020 2
1 limited to distribution service, unless such contract shall provide that
2 any party acting as a payment or collection agent shall be the author-
3 ized payment agent of the electric corporation.
4 4. Each electric corporation which enters into any contract subject to
5 subdivision three of this section shall submit to the commission for
6 approval each such contract which is intended to result in or has
7 resulted in the authorized payment agent having in its custody at any
8 one time more than fifty thousand dollars to be remitted to such elec-
9 tric corporation with respect to payments received with respect to resi-
10 dential units. The commission shall approve such contracts only if it
11 concludes that the authorized payment agent, with or without such secu-
12 rity as the commission shall order, is credit-worthy in view of the
13 foreseeable indebtedness of the authorized payment agent to the electric
14 corporation.
15 § 2. This act shall take effect on the ninetieth day after it shall
16 have become a law.
