Prepaid electricity meters must still be upgraded by 24 November, says City Power

Prepaid electricity meters will not accept new units after 24 November 2024 if they are not upgraded.

Eskom stressed the date for meter upgrades had not been extended, with the South African Local Government Association (Salga) clarifying the nature of the extension.  

City Power previously stated that the token identifier rollover deadline had been extended to 31 May 2025, but clarified that this will only apply to the system that generates the tokens.

No extension for customers

Salga recently announced an extension for the rollover project, which is needed to refresh the generation of the unique 20-digit codes sent to customers.

As a safety feature to avoid duplication, the unique token codes cannot be repeated and must be updated periodically.

ALSO READ: Prepaid electricity token ID rollover deadline extended by six months

Upgrading of electricity meters

Reports of the extension created confusion among prepaid electricity users who may have felt it unnecessary to upgrade their meters with any urgency.

“Customers who have not yet upgraded from KRN1 to KRN2 as required in a month’s time, will no longer be able to load units on their meters after the cut-off date,” confirmed City Power spokesperson Isaac Mangena.

“We would like to emphasise that this extension is specifically limited to the generation of key change tokens only,” he added.

Eskom doubled down on the message, stating: “Failure to recode by the deadline will prevent customers from loading electricity tokens, rendering their meters inoperable.”

Extension for municipalities

Salga spokesperson Sivuyile Mbambato confirmed to The Citizen that deadline extension is related to the upgrading of the software that generates the unique token codes.

“In a nutshell, the deadline has been extended for municipalities, not for customers,” Mbambato said.

ALSO READ: Joburg residents asked to open their doors for free prepaid meter upgrades

Standard Transfer Specification Association is the company who operates the token vending software and Salga’s Dr Silas Mulaudzi explained that they had developed a solution.

“This means that municipalities will be able to continue to generate key change tokens until 31 May 2025 to be converted to KRN2,” Mulaudzi told The Citizen.

He stressed that should the meters not be upgraded by users, the meter will not accept tokens, municipalities may not be able to generate codes to upgrade the meter and the meter will become obsolete.

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