Smart meter woes for residents
Residents are furious over faulty prepaid smart electricity meters that have resulted in high bills and long periods without power.
Residents have been left without power and with high electricity costs because of defective smart prepaid electricity meters installed by the Tshwane metro early this year.
DA councillor Siobhan Muller said the defective meters had done more harm than good for residents and businesses.
Muller said some of the meters did not take recharge vouchers numbers or allocated their credits to someone else and did not give warning before unit credits were exhausted.
“Residents often have to wait for long periods for reconnection even after they have been refunded.
“This has caused embarrassment and frustration that could lead to serious action taken by the public,” said Muller.
The Isa Carstens Beauty Academy in Lynnwood recently went without electricity for a long period.
“Their electricity was cut without warning during an international exam. It took 48 hours to have power restored despite payment being made,” said Muller.
“This was the third such incident since their smart meter was installed.”
In another example, Muller said a small retail node in Hazelwood had its electricity cut, apparently without warning, thereby affecting four restaurants whose fridges were starting to defrost.
Payment had been made but funds not been allocated to the meter.
Said Muller: “Complaints that users were not warned their units were low, were not uncommon nor that electricity cost quadrupled since the installation of the meters. Residents also say their meters used up their credit even during load shedding or power failure; they feel prejudiced.”
He said the fact that the Tshwane metro was supposed to terminate the contract with the meter supplier, PEU, would not resolve the problems affecting these customers.
“Consumers are locked into an expensive and negative system and may need to revert to a legal route to resolve their on-going problems,” said Muller.
Tshwane metro had not responded to questions at the time of going to print.
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