An ESB subsidiary has decided not to pursue a High Court challenge against the electricity regulator, Mr Tom Reeves, over an investigation into anti-competitive practices.
The subsidiary, ESB Independent Energy, was ordered by the regulator to desist from certain practices last year "to protect the interests" of its competitors. While its staff were ordered in a 10-point direction to stop using mobile and landline telephone numbers originally used by the ESB, its management challenged Mr Reeves in the High Court.
The company operates in the part of the market opened to competition in 2000.
It competes against other firms to supply large industrial users of electricity, whose demand is crucial in revenue terms to the ESB. It faced allegations that it was sourcing sensitive information about customers' demand profiles from the ESB, information that was not available to rivals.
For its part, ESB Independent Energy accused certain competitors of "whinging".
In a statement yesterday, the wholly-owned subsidiary said the judicial review it took against Mr Reeves had been struck out after a settlement "on amicable terms". The settlement's terms were confidential and the company would not comment further.
Because the direction published yesterday by Mr Reeves had not changed from the original issued in December 2000, the settlement is seen as something of a climb-down by ESB Independent Energy.
The company is understood to have had strong reservations about one point in Mr Reeves' direction, which he issued "to provide for a level field" in the market. Nine other points in the direction were conceded by the company, but it went to the High Court over the regulator's demand that it seek the sanction of his office before entering supply contracts.
The directions were issued after an investigation by Mr Reeves into complaints by a rival supplier, ePower, about alleged anti-competitive practices.
EPower, which was controlled by the businessman, Mr Denis O'Brien, abandoned the market last October, claiming it had sustained losses of €6 million.
The investigation prompted Mr Reeves to conclude that there was "a lack of appropriate ring-fencing" of information, information systems and resources between the ESB and ESB Independent Energy. "Immediate action" was required, he said, when issuing the direction. While the judicial review was pending, ESB independent Energy was understood to have given an undertaking to the court to maintain an audit trail of contracts offered to customers instead of first satisfying the regulator that the information used in making such offers "was obtained directly from the customer" and not from other sources.
Following the settlement, it must now seek the regulator's sanction for contracts it offered.
Other elements of Mr Reeves' direction included a demand that the company refrain from using information obtained directly from its parent or its IT systems.
It was also ordered to cease using equipment, materials and regional or other offices owned by the ESB. Hyperlinks between websites operated by both companies were also disallowed.
