Power distributor to install smart meters to curb fraud

Kenya Power reading meters manually. Smart technology will make it easier for the company to accurately bill its customers, but more importantly detect and tackle electricity theft. [PHOTO: FILE/STANDARD]

Kenya Power has announced plans to install smart electricity metres in a race to cap soaring meter-reading costs and curtail fraud.

The firm has also said it will be offering temporary employment to about 500 college students that would be contracted as metre readers. Managing Director Dr Ben Chumo yesterday made the announcements, which the company hopes will also address customer complaints related to the use of estimated power consumption for billing.

“...low metre reading coverage averaging 66 per cent has, over the years, led to the accrued debt,” Chumo said. Kenya Power has, however, been collecting up to 99 per cent of its debts, he added. The smart metres will be rolled out on a pilot phase covering Runda, Kariobangi and Nairobi’s Central Business District, before other areas across the rest of the country.

Illegal connections, especially in the informal settlement such Kariobangi have been the main way that the company has been losing electricity – which it buys from generating companies including KenGen.

While the company discounts the losses as minimal to its overall revenues base, Chumo has in the past admitted that it was widespread and was the main reason for electrocutions in settlements like Kibera slums. The gadgets, according to the company, will be transmitting consumption details to the control room continuously.

Such technology will make it easier for the company to accurately bill its customers, but more importantly, detect and tackle electricity theft. Those targeted for connection to the new reading technology are consumers whose consumption is in excess of 1,000 units a month.

Customers owe the power distributor more than Sh3.9 billion, accrued over time, attributable to the low metre reading. The firm now has 700 workers whose job is collecting electricity metre readings from its estimated 3.2 million customers.

A steady rise in the number of new electricity connections has presented a major challenge for the company that had turned to prepaid meters to contain costs related to reading the consumption by pre-paid customers.

Chumo attributes reasons for low metre reading coverage to inaccessible metre boxes, which are located in locked residential premises. Employing the students drawn from the Institute of Energy Studies and Research (formerly Kenya Power Training School) and other technical colleges located near the company’s branches in various parts of the country, is an about-turn from an earlier proposal.

Siphon money

Chumo had in January told The Standard of plans to outsource the entire metering process as part of its strategy to enhance service delivery and grow revenue. Sub-contracting the exercise, he said, would make it easier to get accurate power usage by customers and increase revenue.

He had accused his staff of corruption, a vice that has, “for a long time, denied the company huge sums in revenue”. Some employees of the company were involved in the theft of electricity by conspiring with customers to siphon money from the company through inaccurate metre reading.

A reputable global manufacturing company would be the ideal candidate for the proposed outsourcing. Kenya Power’s more than 600 metre readers would be deployed to other activities within the company to enhance production, according to the plan that now seems to have been shelved. Consumers in remote and distant areas will, henceforth, be primarily post-paid customers, also to enable to company slash on meter reading expenses.