City power installed a new electricity meter in March this year. It is a hexing HXE 130 with gprs/gsm module. They did this quite sneakily even though there was people at home at the time they didn't inform anyone and I happened to get home and saw them in the process of removing the meter. When they said this new meter is better and has two way comms I knew this was the start of trouble as it would be a way for them to throttle your electricity remotely. My average consumption per day used to vary between 13.5kwh most of the year and 17.7 kwh per day in the winter. The last 3 months readings on this new meter average about 21kwh usage per day. This is around a 40% increase after the meter was installed. I have gas stove and solar lights outside for the night. Nothing has changed over the last 3 years and we still have the same geyser and appliances. I have lived in this house for 7 years and the electricity usage has been the same. It has never been over 20kwh for a single month. How do I proceed to report this issue and get the meter tested/replaced. I tested my usage over 24 hours with no heaters being used and very little tv. It still came to 21kwH. This increase in electricity reading has pushed my bill up and I am now entering step 2 of the billing scale. Any advice would be appreciated. I am so frustrated with this.

Bested is buy an energy or usage meter that is installed in you DB box and compare the two to get an better idea of what's going on . 

14 hours ago, Vin said:

City power installed a new electricity meter in March this year. It is a hexing HXE 130 with gprs/gsm module. They did this quite sneakily even though there was people at home at the time they didn't inform anyone and I happened to get home and saw them in the process of removing the meter. When they said this new meter is better and has two way comms I knew this was the start of trouble as it would be a way for them to throttle your electricity remotely. My average consumption per day used to vary between 13.5kwh most of the year and 17.7 kwh per day in the winter. The last 3 months readings on this new meter average about 21kwh usage per day. This is around a 40% increase after the meter was installed. I have gas stove and solar lights outside for the night. Nothing has changed over the last 3 years and we still have the same geyser and appliances. I have lived in this house for 7 years and the electricity usage has been the same. It has never been over 20kwh for a single month. How do I proceed to report this issue and get the meter tested/replaced. I tested my usage over 24 hours with no heaters being used and very little tv. It still came to 21kwH. This increase in electricity reading has pushed my bill up and I am now entering step 2 of the billing scale. Any advice would be appreciated. I am so frustrated with this.

Check carefully. City Power will check a meter for accuracy, but 
1) It's using their test equipment, not any third party equipment you have 
2) If the meter passes their test then the cost is for your account. You could be out of pocket and still be frustrated.

The new meter was installed in March. Are you on prepaid and reading the meter yourself, or on the default tariff? On the latter the City reads the meter - or will give you an estimated billing when they can't do the reading.

If you're on post paid (default) then the readings show on your statement will be at least a month behind real time. So check those dates. Do they correspond with the increase in metered consumption?

Do you have a PV system? That would have it's own measuring of consumption. Check those figures.

Look for the word "estimate" on your bill, and get into the habit of reading your meter yourself. It doesn't matter if you read on the day they read. Say you read on the 10th and the meter shows 12345, then you read on the 20th and it shows 12445. If the City reads on the 13th, then their reading has to be somewhere between 12345 and 12445. Generally check that one month's closing figure on your statement is the next months' opening. 

If your own checks show that you are averaging about 21kWh a day, then check inside your own home before taking up cudgels with the City.

I know this is a pain and maybe not what you want to hear, but I am informed by what happened to a friend of mine some years ago. Her water bill started rising sharply. She started complaining about municipal incompetence and just paid her average payment, because how could she suddenly be using so much water? She was advised to get a plumber in to check, but was adamant it was a municipal problem. This situation persisted, and the debt rose, until she wanted to sell. Now she had to reach settlement with the City. And NOW she called a plumber in. And he found a leak on her side of the meter, under her driveway. If she'd attended to that a year or so earlier she'd have had a much smaller debt to settle and less egg on her face. 

3kWh extra per day (since this is winter) is not a lot to go wrong and is easily accounted for by changes in habits.
 

Hi @Vin

I would not go into the fight with the city without having proper ammo first. These household electricity meters are certified and well-calibrated, so while it's possible that the meter is faulty the chance is pretty low.

Speaking of ammo, just call your sparky and let him install a usage meter in the DB box as @GMAC said. Preferably the one with WIFI and mobile app, so you would be able to get long-term stats and compare them with what the HEX 130 is reporting. Should there be large discrepancy, then you'll get involved with the city.

There's a plenty of suitable devices, your sparky would know for sure what's the best choice. For example, something like these cheap ones:

 

 

 

On 2024/08/19 at 9:40 AM, Bobster. said:

Check carefully. City Power will check a meter for accuracy, but 
1) It's using their test equipment, not any third party equipment you have 
2) If the meter passes their test then the cost is for your account. You could be out of pocket and still be frustrated.

The new meter was installed in March. Are you on prepaid and reading the meter yourself, or on the default tariff? On the latter the City reads the meter - or will give you an estimated billing when they can't do the reading.

If you're on post paid (default) then the readings show on your statement will be at least a month behind real time. So check those dates. Do they correspond with the increase in metered consumption?

Do you have a PV system? That would have it's own measuring of consumption. Check those figures.

Look for the word "estimate" on your bill, and get into the habit of reading your meter yourself. It doesn't matter if you read on the day they read. Say you read on the 10th and the meter shows 12345, then you read on the 20th and it shows 12445. If the City reads on the 13th, then their reading has to be somewhere between 12345 and 12445. Generally check that one month's closing figure on your statement is the next months' opening. 

If your own checks show that you are averaging about 21kWh a day, then check inside your own home before taking up cudgels with the City.

I know this is a pain and maybe not what you want to hear, but I am informed by what happened to a friend of mine some years ago. Her water bill started rising sharply. She started complaining about municipal incompetence and just paid her average payment, because how could she suddenly be using so much water? She was advised to get a plumber in to check, but was adamant it was a municipal problem. This situation persisted, and the debt rose, until she wanted to sell. Now she had to reach settlement with the City. And NOW she called a plumber in. And he found a leak on her side of the meter, under her driveway. If she'd attended to that a year or so earlier she'd have had a much smaller debt to settle and less egg on her face. 

3kWh extra per day (since this is winter) is not a lot to go wrong and is easily accounted for by changes in habits.
 

Thanks for the detailed response. I am on a post-paid account and I have taken into account winter and extra heaters etc being used by comparing it to consumption over the winter period over the last few years. I have also tested it on a 24-hour basis with no use of heaters or anything out of the ordinary and the consumption shows as 21kwH. It also was not unusually cold where the geyser element would be working overtime to keep the water hot. The increase is not 3 kwh but more like 6-7 more for the day. This is about a 40-50% increase in daily consumption.

The high reading started suddenly after the meter was installed. It would be a coincidence that something suddenly is consuming more electricity in the house at the same time the meter was installed. None of the appliances have changed and if this were the case it would have to be an appliance that is constantly plugged in that suddenly is drawing more power. Electricity doesn't leak out like the water leak you pointed out in the example. However, your point is noted. This is an old house with good wiring. I have taken into account whether the reading is actual or estimated reading as well. It was an estimate for the first two months, but the last 2 bills were actual readings showing the entire usage over time from the time the meter was installed. 

I remember an old lady, who's son visited her on the weekend and asked if he could charge his EV (car)...

 

On 2024/08/18 at 6:21 PM, Vin said:

City power installed a new electricity meter in March this year. It is a hexing HXE 130 with gprs/gsm module. They did this quite sneakily even though there was people at home at the time they didn't inform anyone and I happened to get home and saw them in the process of removing the meter. When they said this new meter is better and has two way comms I knew this was the start of trouble as it would be a way for them to throttle your electricity remotely. My average consumption per day used to vary between 13.5kwh most of the year and 17.7 kwh per day in the winter. The last 3 months readings on this new meter average about 21kwh usage per day. This is around a 40% increase after the meter was installed. I have gas stove and solar lights outside for the night. Nothing has changed over the last 3 years and we still have the same geyser and appliances. I have lived in this house for 7 years and the electricity usage has been the same. It has never been over 20kwh for a single month. How do I proceed to report this issue and get the meter tested/replaced. I tested my usage over 24 hours with no heaters being used and very little tv. It still came to 21kwH. This increase in electricity reading has pushed my bill up and I am now entering step 2 of the billing scale. Any advice would be appreciated. I am so frustrated with this.

I had this issue in July 2022 also with a Hexing meter, oddly or coincidently it started when the grid restored from LS and had no Solar at that time. We would blow through 400units in a week, that previously lasted us like closer to 2 weeks.

 

Logged it with CityPower eventually after like 3 weeks and escalating constantly they came out and replaced the meter with the newer AMS meters. I asked them at time if this was a common issue they deal with and the response was yes they do this alot with the meters becoming faulty.

On 2024/08/19 at 12:02 PM, Youda said:

Hi @Vin

I would not go into the fight with the city without having proper ammo first. These household electricity meters are certified and well-calibrated, so while it's possible that the meter is faulty the chance is pretty low.

Speaking of ammo, just call your sparky and let him install a usage meter in the DB box as @GMAC said. Preferably the one with WIFI and mobile app, so you would be able to get long-term stats and compare them with what the HEX 130 is reporting. Should there be large discrepancy, then you'll get involved with the city.

There's a plenty of suitable devices, your sparky would know for sure what's the best choice. For example, something like these cheap ones:

 

 

 

Thanks for the info Youda. I will look into getting one of these installed.

@Vin any updates?

 

I have stumbled across this after meticulously going through my COJ bills from 2023 to present because a year ago we had a new meter installed and now have higher bills.

Like OP, nothing warranting an extra 3kwh per day increase in consumption has changed in our house. In fact, we have installed smart switches on our geysers (which are solar but in winter need supplementation from electricity and before we used to leave them both on for the whole of winter) and we have not used electric heaters half as much as we have in previous years.

Hoping @Vin has an update

I’ve had a similar issue after a new meter was installed without proper notice. Just like you, my electricity usage jumped by over 30% even though nothing had changed in my household — same appliances, same routine. I also suspected the new meter might be reading inaccurately, so I tested my usage with minimal load, yet the readings remained high. It’s frustrating to see billing escalate when your actual consumption hasn’t. Installing an independent usage monitor in your DB board can really help cross-check the readings before escalating the issue to your power company.

In my case, I noticed an unusual spike in my MEPCO bill after a new digital meter was installed. I documented the issue and shared more details here for anyone facing the same problem: https://mepcobillchk.pk/ .

I am busy with the same problem. Hexing HXE130 reads between 25% and 120% over, depending on current - higher current, higher over read. A bad electrical connection (buzzing) to the meter seems to have fixed it a bit, hard to say. I have used a clamp current meter to ascertain the over reading. I am in the process of fighting it out with COJ, I'd be interested to know if anyone else ever won such a fight.