Prepaid electricity meters are running out of digits

Between seven and eight million prepaid electricity meters in South Africa need to be reset before November 24, 2024, as the mechanism used to manage, control and prevent credit token reuse will run out of numbers at this time.

This will result in all existing meters not accepting credit tokens.

However, customers in Ekurhuleni will be safe.According to Themba Gadebe, spokesperson for the metro, the City has been planning for the token identifier (TID) rollover for the last number of years.

“There will be no problem with the almost 340 000 Ekurhuleni prepayment meters. There will be no, or very little, cost implications to the City and zero cost implications to any resident,” he said.

“No contingency is needed as the City of Ekurhuleni is dealing with the TID rollover.”

According to Lance Hawkins-Dady, research and development manager at metering company Conlog (Pty) Ltd and chairperson of the Standard Transfer Specification Association (STSA), the South African metering standards industry body, the association has embarked on an awareness programme to inform utilities about the TID rollover programme.

“Utilities have very little time left. There is a lot of planning that goes into ensuring a TID rollover programme is successfully executed.”

He said currently all tokens contain a TID that is calculated on a base date of 1993. The TID is used to uniquely identify each token so that tokens cannot be used more than once.

“The TID will reach its maximum value in 2024. When this event happens, all tokens will be considered as old and will no longer be accepted by prepaid meters. The only way to prevent tokens being rejected post November 24, 2024, is for end users of the STS technology to have successfully completed the TID rollover programme.”

It is estimated that there are about seven million meters currently in South Africa alone and this is expected to reach eight million by 2024.