Proposal to Discontinue Retail Market Call RMS October 15, 2008

An survey to many of the RMS members that use or have used the Retail Market Call (RMC) as a venue or source of communication were polled for their opinion of the current value of the twice weekly call. The following is a summary of the comments received from respondents: Ad hoc calls, such as Mass Transition Calls, can be set up to address pressing issues instead of having a standing call. There is no longer any discussion of the ERCOT Retail Releases since ERCOT has "vetted" those at TX SET already. Propose having weekly Retail Market Calls (RMC) for about 1-3 weeks after implementation of major TX SET Release or, the associated Market Coordination Team that supports synchronizing the market could just make these calls as part of the implementation planning and post implementation calls. When issues identified are resolved, the calls would stop.

If problem occurs that a TDSP/CR might have announced during the RMC, send to RMC list serve ( the thought is that the RMS list serve might be delivered to an audience not IT related and depending on the contents, may just be forwarded anyway ). For ERCOT system processing issues, RMC list serve already receives ERCOT notices / announcements. The call is attended by only a handful of Market Participants today. A minority perspective was presented: While some MPs convey system issues type information via multiple methods and in multiple forums, there are some that only report that information on the RMC. (My thoughts are that a standard systems issue/outage communication process could be established indicating that market notices are to be presented via either the RMC or RMS listserve.)

In summary, the majority opinion is that the RMC call can be eliminated and recreated on an ad hoc basis if conditions warrant. The nature and catalyst for a Mass Transition Call is a good example of cause and benefit of having the ad hoc ability. RMS recommends: The RMC twice weekly calls be discontinued at the end of October. ERCOT and Market Participants will use RMC listserve to communicate system processing issues. Market processing issues requiring heightened communication can be catalyst for ad hoc RMC calls to be resumed.