Domestic contracting arrangements

It established the Model Retail Contract Project Team (MRCPT) in July 2003 to progress the work. The MRCPT ceased work on the model agreements in May 2004 and the MARIA Governance Board forwarded the draft contracts to the Electricity Commission to progress.

2008 developments

Between 2005 and 2008, the Electricity Commission continued to develop the draft contracts to reflect submissions received at that time and in subsequent consultations and forums. It also progressed a number of other enhancements in the model contracts including:

• developing a set of contract guidelines;
• incorporating arrangements relating to purchases of small surpluses from distributed generation;
• proposals to give effect to the GPS requirement for transparency of charge components on invoices;
• wording to clarify responsibilities in relation to customer service lines; and
• considering alignment issues with other supply chain contracts, particularly Use of Systems Agreements (distribution) and Benchmark Agreements (transmission).

Proposed changes to the Model Domestic Contracts were published in April 2008.

Marked up August 2005 contracts

Marked up versions of the model contracts were then made available to indicate changes since the last consultation:

 April 2005 Workshop on model contracts for domestic consumers

A workshop was held in April 2005 and a draft domestic contract for delivered electricity was released prior to this workshop for discussion at the workshop.

 February 2005 documents

A full package of Model Domestic Contracts (MDC) was published in February 2005. This included:

 2004 consultation

The Electricity Commission issued the draft contracts in September 2004 for consultation and received a number of submissions from retailers, distributors, consumer representatives and what is now the Electricity and Gas Complaints Commission (EGCC).

The Electricity Commission re-drafted the contracts and then held a workshop in April 2005 to cover the main issues arising from submissions.