Today marked the beginning of a two-day workshop on quality of service. The aim of the workshop is to take stock of the EU programmes in place and to access the state of play across the Contracting Parties. The workshop is part of a large scale project aiming to introduce and to improve the quality of electricity service. Initiated by the regulators, the project is an integral part of the ECRB Customer Service working group’s work programme. The Secretariat contracted the Croatian research institute, EIHP, to run the project in Sep 2009.

Low level of electricity supply reliability is a pressing issue in large parts of the Energy Community region. In a short term, liberalization of the electricity market can result in deterioration of electricity supply. It is the task of the regulators to ensure that market opening is achieved without any worsening of quality of service.

The workshop was kicked off with examples that demonstrate the close linkage between quality of service and security of supply. With an example of ancient Egyptian standards on quality of water, quality of supply regulations have a long tradition to boast about. From the regulators point of view, powers to penalize “bad” quality of service, be it physical or financial, is decisive. This approach differs greatly among the EU 27. Whilst monitoring is defined in the EU Regulations 2003/54 and 2009/72, the EU has presently 21 monitoring schemes in place.

The task of the consultant, EIHP, is to provide assistance to national regulatory authorities in introducing and improving quality regulation in the Energy Community. This comprises organization of two workshops, back to back with the ECRB Customer Service Working Group meetings. Between the workshops analytical work will be carried out, paving way to a large scale study. The study will assess the participation of the seven Contracting Parties in the course of the project, outline results achieved and provide suggestions for the next steps.

The second workshop is due to take place in May 2010. The EIHP is expected to present its final study to the Secretariat late summer 2010.