Information Request: Remote Disconnects for non-payment
If your utility remotely disconnects electric meters for non-payment please answer the following:
1. How many electric customers does your utility serve? How many electric meters are on your system? How many of the electric meters on your system are equipped with remote service switch?
2. How many electric meters are remotely disconnected for non-payment each day?
3. Before the remote disconnection occurs, is there an automated process validating that the account qualifies for disconnection or is each account validated manually before the disconnect signal is sent?
4. If each account is validated manually, is the disconnect signal sent as each account is validated or are the accounts placed into a scheduled batch process that takes place at a future time?
Hi Kurt. I’m from PSEG on Long Island New York
Answer 1 – The population of Long Island and the Rockaways is approximately 8 Million and PSEGLI has approximately 1.4 million electric customers in that territory. We are in the process of installing AMI meters on all our accounts so the number changes every day. Currently there are about 500,000 AMI meters installed and about 400,000 have remote switches.
Answer 2 – Our Regulators limit us from disconnecting for non-payment in the Winter. So currently we remotely terminate for non-payment about 40 meters / day. We don’t have any numbers for Summer terminations since this is new to us, but we expect that number to be approximately 100/day
Answer 3 – Our validation process is fully automated. Of course there are always exceptions and at times will manually validate an account if necessary.
Answer 4 – We rarely validate manually, but if we do we the signal is sent as each account is validated
Regards, Bill Funaro
Bill Funaro, Thank you for your information. That is very helpful!