MSEDCL says no prepaid meters being installed at consumers’ premises

Recently were reports that MSEDCL had begun installing pre-paid power meters at consumers’ premises for better electricity consumption monitoring and control.

While many consumers were looking forward to the installation of pre-paid meters at their premises, expecting to monitor their electricity consumption and keep a control on their electricity expenses, this news comes as a depressor.

MSEDCL has now made a U-turn on this subject and has announced that no such meters are being installed at consumers’ premises.

A press release from MSEDCL says, “MSEDCL has taken up the feeder segregation, loss reduction, system strengthening and smart metering program under Revamped Distribution Sector Scheme (RDSS) of Ministry of Power (MoP), Government of India (Gol) after due approval of Maharashtra Electricity Regulatory Commission (MERC). This will help in providing reliable and quality power supply to the consumers in Maharashtra.

Under the smart meter scheme, meters are being installed for system metering i.e. at all the feeders at the substation end, at Distribution transformers and at all the Government offices. No prepaid smart meters are being installed to the common consumers”.

This is a developing story and it will be interesting to know why the power utility company has gone back on its initial plans to install pre-paid smart meters at all consumers’ premises. Stay tuned!