Marketing and Advertising

Section 452 Section 452.110  Marketing and Advertising a)         No electric utility shall allow joint advertising or joint marketing by its transmission and distribution function employees and generation function employees, nor may any product or service offered by its merchant generation function be advertised or marketed with any product or service offered by its transmission and distribution function. However, the advertising of mandatory generation services is not prohibited by this Part so long as there is no direct or indirect involvement in such advertising by transmission and distribution function employees. b)         Upon written request by a customer or potential customer, an electric utility's transmission and distribution function employees may accompany generation function employees at a meeting with the customer or potential customer; provided that transmission and distribution function employees are prohibited from requesting the customer's or potential customer's patronage for any generation service. An electric utility's transmission and distribution function shall process all requests for, and schedule and participate in, joint meetings under this subsection in the same manner as it would upon written request from a customer or potential customer of a non-affiliated ARES or another electric utility. Upon violation of the requirements or prohibitions in this subsection, the Commission may prohibit transmission and distribution function employees from accompanying generation function employees at meetings with customers or potential customers.  The penalty shall be in addition to or in lieu of any penalty imposed by the Commission pursuant to Section 452.160 of this Part. c)         Nothing in subsection (a) shall be construed as prohibiting an electric utility's generation  function from using the corporate name or logo of the electric utility or electric utility holding company. d)         Every electric utility shall distribute a copy of Section 452.130 of this Part or such other notice as the Commission may require to each of its customers. The distribution shall occur on the effective date of this Part, or on or before the date on which a customer becomes eligible to take delivery services, whichever is later.