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Humorous on face value, but that's not what utility companies do. In every utility district I ever lived (and it's a lot), if the meter readers were "unable" to read your meter, the consumption was estimated.
I had many conflicts about this because I traveled a lot for work and knew that there was no possible way I could have consumed as much electricity as they estimated. It turned it that meter readers could just claim the meter was inaccessible, and their job was considered completed.
I think most meters have wireless connectivity now, too. I've never once had someone physically check my meter.
mine was switched to wireless 8 years ago approx, i think they still need to drive around, but how many houses they can cover in a day must have increased by orders of magnitude
Are there really people in the US driving from house to house reading the meters? In Germany you just get a letter (or an email nowadays) asking you to read the meter and tell them. Unless the values you're providing are obviously wrong, noone questions you.
If you lie there you'll be found out when you move out of your apparent or when the meter is changed after 20 or 30 years.
Here in Norway they changed all of our meters to a live upload of consumption. This allowed them to make complicated systems with increasing tiers of "grid rental" prices based on your maximum full hour of kWh consumption per month. My wife is paranoid about washing clothes while I am cooking or running the dryer while the washing machine is running etc. We don't even use that much power since we have external water based heating, so it really doesn't matter much. Fucking shit.
That's some top tier capitalism right there. And i always thought Norway was one of the more forward thinking countries in Europe.
I think it is based on some EU stuff? Lots of our power related issues is based on the new International power cables. Suddenly power got really expensive because some assholes in central EU took over our power pricing around the same time.
We are so afraid of violating the EEC that we implement everything they dream up that is market related even if the EU countries themselves might hold back. Our labor party has sadly turned more and more to the right these last 20 years. Our mainstream right is still more to the left than the US democrats on most things though.
Recently we also got more and more smart meters here in Germany, as there are a few power companies that calculate your price by the hour. But that's not based on your maximum consumption but on the time of the consumption. If you use the solar and wind power on a windy summer day it's basically free, whereas the price goes up when it's expensive power from gas plants on a windless winter night. So you can lower your price by washing or charging your car at the right time.
That probably would not work that way in Norway as you have a lot of hydroelectric power which is available much more continuously, as far as I understand.
We have that pricing as well but we also pay a dynamic cost to be connected to the grid. When the power is cheap the grid cost is the biggest part of the bill.
With regards to our Hydro power: since the europeans took over we tap all of our water reserves and sell it cheap to the continent ever since the large acer cables came. When the winter comes our reserves are low and we buy expensive power back. It's been like that for a few years now. The government are looking into making a subsidy or tax break or something to compensate but EU is blocking it as market manipulation or something like that. It sucks ass.
In our area the meters are all set up to be read via short-range wireless (zigbee). So a car drives down the street once a month with a laptop in the passenger seat and that's pretty much it.
Where I live they check once a year and ask you to report monthly.
Every month is wild. Do the electricity prices change based on the season or why can't they just calculate the average over a year?
Wait fuck I switched up gas and electricity. Electricity used to zo be done that way but then they installed the automated meters.
It’s ridiculous how obsolete US utility companies are, especially water companies that often require you to show up to their office in person to activate service or set up automatic payments (You want a voided paper check? I don’t even have checks for my account. What’s wrong with a debit card?).
And they go crazy with their estimated bills. I worked an IT job where I’d fly to some city in the US for a week of work, fly home on Friday, do laundry and submit expense reports, and do it all again the next week. Was pretty much never home. Got a water bill for $300+, and they wanted to try and argue with me that the bill was correct. They suggested maybe I had a leak somewhere, as if a leak that resulted in a $300+ bill wouldn’t have been causing some blatantly obvious issues that I would have seen.
Oh, it's unreal. You probably know this, but for anyone else reading the thread: water meters have a leak indicator. On analog meters, it's a small spinning indicator; it could be a dial, needle, or just a spinning icon.
I’m confused, how does this leak indicator work?
Whenever even a slight amount of water flows, it spins. Shut off all the faucets and spigots, and it should not move. If it moves, you have a leak.
Now they're doing readings from their trucks remotely via wireless technology.
They can shut your power remotely.
Exactly.
I believe the joke is that since they stopped paying their bills, and the decoy prevents utility workers from coming and turning off the power, that’s the free power they are referring to in the meme.
In my country is the same ways but the value paid is corrected when they do get the measurement, so if you paid more in the estimate you get it deducted. Not sure what happens if they can never get a measurement.
You guys are missing the point- reading the meter isn't the problem. To disconnect you, they open the cover the nest is built on, and pull the clear plastic meter out.
Though the one in the picture has a clamp ring instead, you'd still disturb them.
Jokes on them. My electric company reads the meter from thier office and can shut power down remotely.
Fill their office with wasps, problem solved
Same here and a hell of a security risk if you think about it
Congratulations! We've been misreporting your electricity use and have remediated the charges. You now owe $4200 in past due charges, due immediately, or your service will be terminated.
Hopefully they set a password unlike that water supply facility
Heh.. Bee-coy
Several years ago, before we got the transmitter-type meters, they would sometimes estimate our usage. We didn't know that until after several months of estimates they came out and actually read it. Apparently, their previous estimates were all low, and suddenly we were hit with a $900+ bill to catch us back up. That sucked. I also remember meeting one of the readers who was going house to house. Our next-door-neighbor's house is completely fenced in, so the reader would come down our driveway and read our meter, then use a pair of binoculars to read the neighbors meter from our yard.
I'd fight em and refuse to pay the extra on the bill. It's not your responsibility to fix their fuck-up when they are the ones estimating and billing you. If they want their money they shouldve given you the correct bill the first time. It's like getting a cheeseburger for $5, and then the restaurant realizes inflation exists and comes banging on your door for another $10 a month later.
You obviously are not responsible for paying for your electricity eh. That's not how it works.
Estimated bills are labeled as such, and directions are given for providing an updated amount. Also, since they tell you what the charge per unit is, there's nothing to stop you from doing the math yourself and sending more than the estimate in anticipation of the estimate being wrong.
it could be a solution twenty- or thirty-some years ago. at least to keep the readers from getting near.
but, they don't have to be near to read do they?
or, as others have pointed out, the power company can always fudge it and shift you the burden of proof.