Diana Nherera Suburban Reporter
The Zimbabwe Electricity Transmission and Distribution Company (ZETDC) will start upgrading pre-paid meters for its customers in Harare Region North District on Wednesday November 15, 2023.
The targeted suburbs include Mabelreign, Bloomingdale, Ashdown Park, Greencroft, Avondale, Emerald Hill, Belvedere, Milton Park, Meyrick Park, Strathaven, Sunridge, Sentosa, Ridgeview, Haig Park, Belgravia, Cotswold Hills, Westlea, Sandton, Glaudina, Tynwald, Madokero, Westgate, Good Hope, Marlborough, Mt Hampden and Dzivarasekwa.
Ms Alaina Suliwa from the ZETDC public relations department told Suburban that the power utility is conducting the upgrades as part of compliance required by the Standard Transfer Specification (STS) system.
“All utilities using the prepaid STS system have to do the upgrades by November 24, 2024 to enable their meters to continue accepting tokens beyond that date,” she said.
Ms Suliwa said the upgrades are not unique to Zimbabwe but to all utilities the world over with meters that use the STS system.
“South Africa’s Eskom and Zambia’s ZESCO have also started the exercise,” she said.
Ms Suliwa said customers can do the upgrades in the comfort of their homes by entering a set of key change tokens that are going to be supplied by the utility when the customer buys tokens.
She said ZETDC will activate the key change tokens area by area and will advise its clients area by area.
“When customers buy electricity, they will get three sets of 20 digit tokens that they are supposed to enter in the meter one after the other in the order they are provided and in the same manner they top-up electricity.”
She said the exercise is free of charge and meters that do not comply with this system will be changed at the power utility’s cost and customers are not required to pay for the meter change.
