Whose fault is it for not upgrading Eskom’s prepaid electricity meters?

It’s just amazing that a few days before the years-long deadline to upgrade Eskom’s prepaid electricity meters, there are still 2.2 million that haven’t been updated. The consequence will be a hefty bill (I’ve heard as high as R17,000) to physically replace the now defunct meter which hasn’t been fed the 20-digit update code.

It seems like a serious penalty to pay for not doing a software upgrade, doesn’t it? On the other hand, this has been in the works for several years.

I know because I did the upgrade myself about a year ago, maybe longer. A hot, beleaguered guy in a Day-Glo orange vest arrived at my house to help upgrade the meter, he said. I answered the gate buzzer and went outside to talk to him.

As soon as I started the now usual process of checking his credentials (I had heard on 702 that this process was happening), he had the resigned look of someone who has been through this before. A lot.

It was one of the subtle clues that told me he was on the level. He was used to dealing with his ID card being photographed by well-meaning, but paranoid suburbanites, scrutinising his instruction form and peering at the notes on his phone with its heavily cracked screen.

Read More: South Africa’s 36.1% electricity price hike for 2025: why the power utility Eskom’s request is unrealistic

As I went inside to check on this, I went to the kitchen and made him a cheese and tomato sandwich and gave it to eat with a bottle of water while I did the software upgrade. It was the least I felt I could do for someone who just doing his job and being the butt of everyone’s paranoia, including mine.

I have obviously read and heard enough horror stories about fake municipal contractors pretending to read an electricity meter and then robbing the house and traumatising the inhabitants. But I knew – from good old human observation and intuition from this poor guy’s bona fide reaction to my paranoid suspicions – that he was the real deal.

I always caution that the best defence against scams is common sense: if it sounds too good to be true, it isn’t.

Similarly, common sense must surely prevail when it comes to this long-running prepaid meter upgrade. Surely, if you are a prepaid meter user, you have heard of the impending problems unless you upgrade the software.

Stuff strongly advocates this for software patches and system upgrades. That’s one way to stay ahead of the cybercriminals, as Eugen Kaspersky told me.

Blame culture

For many years I have strongly believed it serves no purpose to blame the victims (of any crime, but especially cybercrime) who are already the victims and don’t need to be shamed.

Similarly, if people can’t solve their own, widely publicised problems, we can’t afford them the indulgence for not applying their own common sense. I have been thinking about both of these angles to the prepaid meter conundrum this week. I don’t have the answer.

All I have is my 96-year-old mother’s exhortation to always do the right thing and always look after my own problems. She fought off many of life’s worst prejudices and always did the right thing – under Apartheid nogal.

Part of defending yourself against scams – cyber or real-world – is having a grounding in common sense. Without growing up with the indomitable Sylvia Shapshak as a mother, how do we educate youngsters on scale?

The obvious answer is, to apply common sense.

Thanks for teaching me that ma.

Read Eskom’s instructions to update a prepaid meter