Solution to complete meter reading and electricity bill at the end of the month

In order to gradually improve customer service quality, implement digital transformation, and facilitate customers in monitoring and tracking monthly electricity meter reading schedules, the Central Power Corporation (EVNCPC) has implemented a roadmap to change the meter reading date to the end of the month for 4.7 million electricity customers in 13 provinces and cities in the Central Highlands region, expected to be completed for 100% of customers in 2024.

The electricity industry focuses on improving the quality of electricity services by supporting customers in installing equipment and committing to using electricity economically and efficiently. Photo: LK

Changing the meter reading date to the end of the month is done based on the consensus and agreement of electricity customers, through the agreement and electricity purchase contract signed between the customer and the electricity seller. In the month when the meter reading date is changed to the end of the month, the number of days of electricity use by customers will be more than the same period, correspondingly the electricity consumption will be higher than the same period.

Changing the meter reading date does not affect the customer's rights, the electricity usage rate and the customer's electricity bill are still guaranteed to be calculated correctly according to the current electricity price regulations. In the following months, the number of days of electricity usage is equal to the number of days in the month.

Electricity companies of provinces and cities shall report to local authorities and local state management agencies, send information and instructions on how to calculate electricity bills, and tools to support electricity bill calculation via customer care information channels before implementation for customers to conveniently monitor and check. Accordingly, customers can monitor daily electricity consumption, refer to the tools to support electricity bill calculation on EVNCPC's official website or via the phone application.

After more than 2 months of implementing the meter reading and electricity bill issuance at the end of the month, some advantages and shortcomings have been revealed that need to be promptly resolved. In terms of advantages, customers can easily remember, monitor, and check electricity consumption indexes according to the correct number of days in the month (from the 1st to the end of the month). Improve customer service quality, create efficiency, transparency, and ease of understanding in the management of electricity metering, meter reading, and electricity bill issuance. Facilitate the monitoring, management, and collection of electricity bills.

However, this work is still facing some difficulties and shortcomings. That is, the volume of work performed on the program in a day is very large (due to the meter reading and billing being done in one day), creating pressure for the staff and employees of the electricity industry. On the other hand, due to the large volume of work, the number of errors arising in a day is large and the waiting time for error handling is quite long.

Checking indexes and controlling abnormal output ensures that invoices are issued without errors, the volume that must be done in a day is very large. In particular, in some cases, it is necessary to coordinate with customers to control abnormal output, but due to the time being too late, it is impossible to contact customers to do so.

There is a lot of work, requiring a large number of human resources to perform the work, including some stages of work such as inputting, controlling indexes, calculating invoices, checking unusual customers, coordinating error handling... requiring the performer to have skills and experience, while in the past, each of these jobs at the units was usually only assigned to one person, and training additional human resources took time. In addition, in the process of operating and coordinating between the work stages, the requirements are high and require general managers to monitor and operate the work regularly...

From the above difficulties, PC Quang Tri has found a solution to overcome them. That is, every day we must focus on monitoring and handling customers with abnormal output warnings on the program https:// gssldien.cpc.vn. Review and handle offline measurement points before the meter reading date at the end of the month, ensuring the proportion of measurement points with online data on the meter reading date.

Review and complete the steps of dismantling the metering system, check to ensure the accuracy of the dismantling index on the CMIS program. Do not dismantling the metering system on the day of recording the index, except in cases of force majeure. Check and handle customers with unusual output, customers with suspected standing, burning, or broken meters before the end-of-month meter reading date according to the list provided by the company to reduce the burden of control on the day of recording the meter reading, and issue invoices at the end of the month.

Arrange enough staff at the end and beginning of the month to carry out tasks according to the workload. Employees when performing the task of recording indexes and creating electronic invoices must strictly follow the company's instructions. Promptly submit errors and coordinate with the company's support departments, CPCIT, EVNICT to handle errors arising during the implementation of the business. Promptly check and respond to the inspection results for customers with abnormalities that the company receives from customers.

Lam Khanh

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