Estate Living Magazine Connection - Issue 43 July 2019 | Page 37

I N V E S T
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D E V E L O P
fee, a channel fee, and sometimes even a building recovery fee.
Traditionally, like cell phone charges, prepaid is a little more
expensive than post-paid.
Municipalities across the country are encouraging the inclusion of
prepaid meters in new dwellings. In fact, the City of Cape Town has
made it mandatory, and is encouraging usage of prepaid meters
through its meter replacement programme, in which defunct
credit meters are being replaced with prepaid meters at no cost to
residents. Eventually all neighbourhoods in the city will undergo the
conversion.
budgets and, in some cases, reduce their energy consumption.
The prepay power model has been estimated to reduce average
consumption by between 10 and 15 per cent, a significant
reduction when one considers that behavioural efficiency
programmes have yielded a low reduction of only three per cent.
There’s no question that gaining a better understanding of
your household’s energy consumption habits could save you
on your monthly electricity bill, and reduce your impact on the
environment. By fitting a prepaid meter in your home, you can
begin to measure exactly what you spend on your electricity,
when and why.
In a rental environment, prepaid sub-meters assist property
owners to collect prepaid payments from their tenants. Citiq
Prepaid Managing Director Michael Franze explains that prepaid
sub-meters provide transparency, and reduce risk for everyone
involved.
Energy is a precious resource, and managing its consumption is
becoming increasingly important, not only in financial terms, but
also for the benefit of our environment. Are you ready to take your
energy consumption seriously? It’s time to join the prepaid meter
revolution.
About Citiq Prepaid
Started in 2010, Citiq Prepaid has become the biggest and
fastest-growing prepaid meter and utility vending system
provider to landlords, bodies corporate, property managers,
property developers and electrical contractors. To date,
it has sold 850 GWh of electricity (equivalent to 25 years of
the output of one 4MWh power station) through hundreds of
thousands of active meters across South Africa. An ongoing
pioneer in the prepaid sub-metering vending industry, Citiq
Prepaid’s proprietary vending system enables property
owners and landlords, as well as their tenants, to access
detailed reports to efficiently track and manage electricity
and water purchases. This helps eliminate unexpected
costs, quickly resolves disputes, and takes the hassle out of
payments, so that utilities can stay on.
citiqprepaid.co.za
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While most of the cost of prepaid electricity goes to purchasing
electricity, there are some additional costs, including a service
In the UK, some 12 to 15 per cent of consumers already have prepaid
smart meters installed in their home, with 27 million scheduled to be
installed by the end of 2019. In the United States, 60 million meters
will be installed by 2020, and in Japan, 17 million prepaid smart
meters will be installed in Tokyo by end 2019, according to research
firm, Frost & Sullivan.
‘Funds are collected from tenants upfront and are kept in a trust
account. Citiq Prepaid levies an 8.75% handling fee, and then
transfers the collected funds to the landowner who pays the
municipal bill directly, enabling the landlord to stay in control
of the billing relationship with the municipality, but with no
collection issues. For tenants, prepaid makes their own electricity
consumption more visible and ultimately more manageable.
If you only get your bills a month or more in arrears, it’s easy to
forget that day you accidentally left the heater on, and wonder
if the landowner is overcharging you. When you can track your
consumption from day to day, or even from hour to hour, it’s
much easier to budget.’
The market for prepaid meters worldwide is gaining steady ground,
due to the spread of smart metering technology, and growing
acceptance of the idea of pre-paying for services. Navigant Research
estimates that by 2024, the installed base of prepaid meters will grow
to 85.1 million households globally, driven by the need to achieve
operational efficiencies, reduce energy consumption and comply
with regulations.