Texas Administrative Code
Title 16 - ECONOMIC REGULATION
Part 2 - PUBLIC UTILITY COMMISSION OF TEXAS
Chapter 26 - SUBSTANTIVE RULES APPLICABLE TO TELECOMMUNICATIONS SERVICE PROVIDERS
Subchapter J - COSTS, RATES AND TARIFFS
Section 26.227 - Procedures Applicable to Nonbasic Services and Pricing Flexibility for Basic and Nonbasic Services for Chapter 58 Electing Companies
Universal Citation: 16 TX Admin Code § 26.227
Current through Reg. 50, No. 13; March 28, 2025
(a) Application. This section applies to any electing company as the term is defined in the Public Utility Regulatory Act (PURA) §58.002 who chooses to offer nonbasic services and/or exercise pricing flexibility for basic and nonbasic services through informational notice filings. Other sections applicable to an electing company include, but are not limited to, § 26.224 of this title (relating to Requirements Applicable to Basic Network Services for Chapter 58 Electing Companies), § 26.225 of this title (relating to Requirements Applicable to Nonbasic Services for Chapter 58-Electing Companies) and § 26.226 of this title (relating to Requirements Applicable to Pricing Flexibility for Chapter 58 Electing Companies). Notwithstanding other provisions of this section, PURA §55.003 and §55.004 do not apply to the retail services offered by an electing company, or to the retail nonbasic services offered by a transitioning company, as defined by PURA §65.002.
(b) Purpose. The purpose of this section is to establish procedures for an electing company that chooses to provide an informational notice to introduce nonbasic services, including new services, and/or to exercise pricing flexibility for basic and nonbasic services, and for complaints regarding service offerings introduced through informational notice filings.
(c) Informational notice filing and notice requirements related to pricing flexibility and nonbasic services, including new services.
(1) Notice
requirements.
(A) General notice
requirements. An electing company shall provide the informational notice in
compliance with this section to the commission, to the Office of Public Utility
Counsel (OPC), and to any person who holds a certificate of operating authority
in the electing company's certificated area or areas, or who has an effective
interconnection agreement with the electing company.
(B) Unless an interconnection agreement
contract specifies otherwise, an incumbent local exchange carrier shall
continue to provide to affected resellers of retail services the same notice of
rate changes or withdrawal of detariffed services that it was required to
provide prior to detariffing.
(2) Filing requirements:
(A) Filing of informational notice and
confidential information. At the time the informational notice is filed in
Central Records, a copy of the informational notice, including confidential
information, shall be delivered to OPC. In addition to the record copy, an
additional copy of any confidential information shall be filed in Central
Records for use by the commission staff.
(i)
The commission shall assign each informational notice a unique control number
and shall stamp the tariff sheets "received".
(ii) The commission staff shall file any
notice of deficiencies for incomplete filings not in compliance with this
section or pleading alleging that the service offering is inappropriately filed
as an informational notice filing within three working days after the date of
the filing of the informational notice.
(iii) Within two working days after the date
of the commission staff's filing, the applicant shall file an explanation of
the actions it has taken or intends to take in response to a notice or pleading
filed under clause (ii) of this subparagraph.
(B) Effective date. A service offering shall
be effective no earlier than ten days after the electing company files a
complete informational notice with the commission.
(C) Access to confidential information.
Access to confidential information filed with the commission as part of an
informational notice filing shall be available to commission staff and OPC,
upon execution of a commission approved protective agreement, at the time the
informational notice is filed.
(D)
Format of filing. An informational notice under this section must include the
following elements:
(i) name of
company;
(ii) PURA chapter under
which company operates;
(iii) date
of submission;
(iv) effective
date;
(v) new and/or revised tariff
pages, written in plain language and conforming with §
26.207 of this title (relating to
Form and Filing of Tariffs); except that an informational notice filing that
cross-references the rates, terms, and/or conditions of the utility's
interstate switched-access tariff for an equivalent service may be considered
sufficient. To implement concurrence of a utility's federal interstate
switched-access tariff and its Texas intrastate switched-access tariff, the
utility in the informational notice portion of its initial filing shall
reference the uniform resource locator (URL or worldwide web address) on the
Federal Communications Commission (FCC) website specific to the interstate
switched-access tariff. Additionally, the utility shall reference the URL on
the utility's commercial website specific to the intrastate switched-access
tariff either in the informational notice portion of the filing or in the
page(s) attached to the informational notice portion of the filing. Thereafter,
the utility must notify the commission, in an informational notice filing,
within 10 business days of any changes to the referenced concurring interstate
rates. In any such filing, the utility shall provide in the informational
notice portion of its filing the corresponding FCC Transmittal Number,
reference the URL on the FCC website specific to the transmittal, specify which
rate elements changed, and reference the URL on the utility's commercial
website specific to the intrastate switched-access tariff. The utility must
also file an update to any URL(s) referenced in its intrastate tariff within 10
business days of any changes to such URL(s). If switched-access rates are no
longer required to concur with federal rates, a new tariff must be
filed;
(vi) proposed implementation
date (if different from effective date);
(vii) affidavit of notice to OPC, COA
holders, and parties to interconnection agreements;
(viii) type of filing (new service; pricing
flexibility involving basic service; non-basic only pricing flexibility;
packaging, term and volume discount or promotional offering regulated by PURA
§58.004; customer specific contract; customer specific contract regulated
by PURA §58.003; promotional offering);
(ix) relevant Long Run Incremental Cost
(LRIC) study or LRIC study reference, and relevant support materials
(confidential/proprietary/protected materials provided to commission only).
When LRIC studies for which commission approval has not been obtained are
provided with an informational notice filing, an application for approval of
that LRIC study must be filed pursuant to the standards in §
26.214 of this title (relating to
Long Run Incremental Cost (LRIC) Methodology for Services Provided by Certain
Incumbent Local Exchange Companies (ILECs)) or §
26.215 of this title (relating to
Long Run Incremental Cost Methodology for Dominant Certificated
Telecommunications Utility (DCTU) Services), as applicable, to establish a LRIC
floor and shall be filed before or simultaneously with the informational
filing. The electing company shall file a notice of intent to file LRIC studies
pursuant to §
26.214 or §
26.215 of this title no later than
ten days prior to the filing of the LRIC study;
(x) a response of "yes", "no", or "not
applicable", with explanatory language to the following question: "Is the sum
of the Total Element Long Run Incremental Cost (TELRIC)-based wholesale prices
of components needed for provision of the retail service at or below the retail
price set forth in this filing?" If the response is "yes" or "no", the filing
must identify the components needed for the provision of the retail service,
along with a list of relevant wholesale and retail prices;
(xi) a response of "yes" or "no" to the
following question: "Is the service available for resale by a competitor? If
the answer is "no", does the proposed price meet the standards set forth in
§
26.274(f) - (h)
of this title (relating to Imputation)?" For purposes of this question,
"available for resale" means:
(I) the service
is not subject to tariffed resale restrictions; and
(II) the electing company is not aware of any
constraints that would prevent a competitor from functionally provisioning the
service to the competitor's customers in parity with the electing company's
provisioning of the service to the electing company's customers;
(xii) for package offerings that
combine regulated products or services with unregulated products or services
and/or with the products or services of an electing company's affiliate, an
affidavit indicating that the price of the package, in addition to the
requirements of §
26.226(d)(1) of
this title, also recovers the cost to the electing company of acquiring and
providing the unregulated products or services or the affiliate's products or
services. The affidavit shall also indicate that the cost to the electing
company of acquiring and providing an affiliate's products or services is
greater than or equal to the cost to the affiliate of acquiring and/or
providing the products or services. The cost to an electing company of
acquiring or providing the affiliate's products or services shall be valued in
a manner consistent with FCC requirements and with §
26.226(d)(5) of
this title. For a joint marketing effort that includes regulated products or
services and the products or services of an affiliate, an affidavit shall be
provided by each affected affiliate attesting that the affiliate's costs are
recovered in a manner consistent with §
26.226(d)(5) of
this title and FCC requirements, if any;
(xiii) description of the offering's terms
and conditions, including location of service or a statement that it is to be
provided state-wide; and
(xiv) a
privacy concerns statement.
(d) Disputes as to sufficiency or appropriateness of informational notice filing.
(1) If the electing company advises the
commission by written filing that a dispute exists with respect to a notice of
deficiency or the inappropriateness of an informational notice, and requests
the assignment of an administrative law judge to resolve the dispute, the
commission will consider the dispute to be a contested case.
(2) A contested case will also exist if the
commission files a complaint addressing sufficiency or appropriateness of an
informational notice filing.
(3)
Parties other than the commission staff may not challenge the sufficiency of an
informational notice filing.
(e) Complaints regarding service offerings introduced by informational notice filings. An affected person, OPC, or the commission may file a complaint at the commission on or after the date the informational notice has been filed. The filing of a complaint will initiate a contested case.
(1) A complaint addressing an
informational notice filing may challenge whether the filing is in compliance
with PURA and/or commission substantive rules.
(2) If a complaint challenging the price of a
new service is resolved in a final order issued by this commission in favor of
the complainant, the electing company shall either:
(A) not later than the tenth day after the
date the complaint is finally resolved, amend the price of the service as
necessary to comply with the final resolution; or
(B) discontinue the service.
(3) The commission shall dismiss a
complaint filed prior to the filing of an informational notice on the grounds
that the commission lacks jurisdiction to hear the complaint.
(4) All complaints shall be docketed and
governed by the commission's procedural rules and shall be filed and reviewed
pursuant to the following requirements:
(A)
Complaints shall be captioned: COMPLAINT BY {NAME OF COMPLAINANT} REGARDING
TARIFF CONTROL NUMBER(S) {NUMBER(S)} {STYLE OF TARIFF CONTROL
NUMBER}.
(B) Processing. The
commission shall assign each complaint filed with respect to an informational
notice a unique control number. The presiding officer shall cause a copy of
each complaint, bearing the assigned control number, to be filed in the
relevant tariff control number(s) for the related informational notice
filings.
(5) The
commission staff shall have standing in all proceedings related to
informational notice filings before the commission, and may intervene by filing
a notice of intervention, at any time prior to determination on the merits. No
motion is necessary for such intervention.
(6) A complaint filed pursuant to this
section shall be considered to be an exception to the informal resolution
requirements of §
22.242(c) of
this title (relating to Complaints).
(f) Interim relief. A tariff for a new service introduced by an informational notice may not be suspended during the pendency of any complaint. All other tariffs introduced by informational notice filings will remain in effect during the pendency of any complaint unless interim relief suspending the tariff is granted pursuant to this subsection.
(1) Any request that a tariff be suspended
during the pendency of a complaint must meet the following requirements:
(A) the pleading must state an appropriate
and bona fide cause of action;
(B)
the pleading must be verified or supported with affidavits based on personal
knowledge; and
(C) the pleading
must set forth the following elements: probable right of recovery, probable and
irreparable injury in the interim, and no adequate alternative
remedy.
(2) The
presiding officer shall schedule a hearing on interim relief in the form of
suspension of a tariff on an expedited basis.
(3) The burden of proof shall be upon the
complainant with respect to each element of proof necessary to obtain any
interim relief requested by the complainant.
(g) A telecommunications provider that is not subject to rate-of-return regulation under PURA, Chapter 53:
(1) may, but is not required to, maintain on
file with the commission tariffs, price lists, or customer service agreements
governing the terms of providing service;
(2) may make changes in its tariffs, price
lists, and customer service agreements in relation to services that are not
subject to regulation without commission approval; and
(3) may cross-reference its federal tariff in
its state tariff if its intrastate switched access rates are the same as its
interstate switched access rates.
(h) A telecommunications provider may withdraw a tariff, price list, or customer service agreement not required to be filed or maintained with the commission under this section if the provider:
(1) files written notice of the withdrawal
with the commission; and
(2)
notifies its customers of the withdrawal and posts the current tariffs, price
lists, or generic customer service agreements on its Internet
website.
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