A ‘CUPS crossover’ is a problem for the electricity consumer that means that the consumer who requests a change of electricity company is erroneously assigned the CUPS of another user, and consequently, the consumer would be billed for the consumption of someone else’s home or premises.
The consumer who loses his usual CUPS, as a direct consequence, would cease to be supplied by his usual supplier, not knowing the name of the supplier who made the erroneous change as he does not appear as the holder in the distribution company. If the distributor who made the mistake were to find out, it would be very difficult for the consumer to make a claim against the distributor, as they would not recognise him as a customer. In the worst case scenario, the consumer could suffer a supply cut-off when the other consumer who was wrongly assigned his or her CUPS cancels the new contract or stops paying bills when he or she receives a double invoice.
The CNMC has been observing during the years 2021 and 2022, as well as frequently receiving numerous complaints from electricity consumers for this same cause, changes of electricity companies without the consent of the customers and motivated by erroneous supply codes (CUPS) in the new contracts.
Specifically, the CNMC has adopted a reinforcement of the measures that marketers must comply with during changes of supplier in the electricity sector, with this legally binding decision being directly applicable to the marketers Endesa Energía S.A.U, Naturgy Iberia S.A, Iberdrola Clientes, S.A.U. and HolaLuz Clidom, S.A.
In this way, these marketers will have to clearly and separately show the customer the trinomial holder-address of the supply point-CUPS during the contracting process, as well as requesting confirmation from the customer of this data on a durable medium if they detect any type of discrepancy in the information.
In the event of a new erroneous assignment, the CNMC establishes as a precaution that, in the event of a supply cut-off request, a ‘CUPS cross-referencing’ will be ruled out, and the requesting consumer must be contacted, in addition to providing the regulator with proof of these contacts if necessary. In the event of a ‘CUPS crossing’, the responsible marketer will be responsible for requesting the replacement of the supply point of the affected consumer to the previous marketer as soon as possible.