How to check if your electricity meter has been upgraded
Customers whose meters have not been updated will be in the dark as purchased tokens will not reflect after November 24.
POLOKWANE – With the deadline looming to upgrade prepaid meters by November 24, residents can now check their units at home.
According to Eskom, all prepaid meters based on Standard Transfer Specification (STS) technology will stop accepting new credit tokens when these vending codes expire. This will mean they will stop dispensing electricity after the existing credit is used up, thus making the meter inactive.
Read more: Significant progress in updating Polokwane’s pre-paid meters
“Each credit token has a unique TID encoded in the 20 digits to prevent token replay at the meter. The TID is referenced to a base date 1993 and will run out of range on November 24 (known as the TID rollover event), thus causing the pre-paid meter to stop accepting new tokens,” their website reads.
The STS Association says the technical remedy is to “reset” each meter to reference a new base date of 2014 by entering two special tokens before November 2024.
In order to do this, residents can follow the following steps:
- Enter the code 1844 6744 0738 4377 2416 on your prepaid meter’s keypad.
- The screen will display either the number one or two and in some cases, there may also be alphabetic letters alongside the KRN number.
- Number one means your meter is still on KRN1 and needs to be recoded/upgraded to KRN2.
- Number two means your meter has been recoded/upgraded to KRN2.
- Your credit token slip will also reflect KRN2 when you make electricity purchases.
Eskom also suggests logging a fault at alfred.eskom.co.za or contact customer services at 08600 37566.
Meanwhile, the Polokwane Municipality’s spokesperson Thipa Selala said residents whose meters are currently disconnected are encouraged to visit the Civic Centre or any cluster office as it may be tied to outstanding municipal account payments.
“We encourage affected customers to visit the Civic Centre or any of our cluster offices to arrange payment terms. The municipality remains committed to ensuring that any service interruptions due to faults are promptly resolved by our electrical department,” he said.
