UPDATE: Eskom and Municipalities Key Revision Number (KRN) Rollover Plan for Prepaid Meters

Should you have a main prepaid electricity meter in your home it may have to be ‘recoded’ in order to continue dispensing electricity after November 2024.

Please note that this also applies to PRIVATE pre-paid meters as supplied by Straton Electrical Pre-Paid and the many other vendors around the world.

With regards to the main utilities plans to recode existing meters Eskom has provided an update on its meter recoding initiative for all its customers and says that it is on track to meet the November 2024 deadline to recode around 6.8 Million pre-paid meters.

Eskom and all the electricity distributors in South Africa are required to recode prepaid electricity meters. The current Token Identifier (TID) code will expire on 24 November 2024 and after this date all Standard Transfer Specification (STS) compliant meters will stop accepting credit tokens. Most meters in the country fall within this category. In a virtual media briefing (see video), Eskom provided an update on its Key Revision Number (KRN) rollover project which is aimed at ensuring that all Eskom 6.8 million prepaid electricity meters are recoded before the deadline. This comes after a successful Phase 1 deployment in August and September 2023, dedicated to clear all the initial glitches and teething KRN rollover process issues were completed.

Eskom has done a ‘soft rollout’ of the DIY approach and reports that over 600 000 Key Vhange Tokens have been succesfully applied. There is no charge for this service and Eskom encourages consumers to report anyone or any company wanting to charge to do the recode.

All prepaid meters must be recoded, whether you are an Eskom customer or a municipality supplied customer or a private pre-paid meter owner.

This programme is a customer DIY rollover. As a prepaid meter user, you will be guided on how to recode your own meter. It is very easy. Just follow three steps, and you are done!

Get your two key change tokens from your local or online vendor when Eskom prompts you that your area is active follow these steps:

Enter the first of the 20-digit codes into the system and wait for it to be accepted.
After the code has been accepted, the second 20-digit code must be entered.
A third code – which is the top-up token – can then be entered. Customers will know the system has been successfully updated when the top-up token is successfully loaded.

“It is all systems go for the Key Revision Number rollover project. The various provincial teams are working around the clock to ensure that everyone is recoded before the due date. We understand that there is no major project without glitches, but this is a commitment we have made to ourselves and will put every effort towards delivering on it,” said Eskom’s General Manager: Operations Enablement, Velaphi Ntuli.

Eskom confirmed that a Do It Yourself (DIY) approach is a more convenient and cost-effective approach for the rollout. Easy step-by-step guides are available on the various Eskom’s communication channels including social media platforms, Alfred Chatbot, and the Eskom website to enable a seamless process.

Progress of the rollout will be monitored centrally daily through a dashboard and support will be provided through various customer support mechanisms in place. Customers will be issued with a pair of key change tokens at the time when they purchase their normal top-up prepaid electricity via any of the Eskom approved vending channels and outlets.

Customers should make sure that all pre-purchased tokens are loaded into the meter before recoding the meter as these will not work after recoding.

“It is critical that I emphasise that the recoding of meters is done at no cost to the customers. Therefore, we caution customers against scammers who would attempt to take advantage of the recoding process and request for any form of payment for this service. Furthermore, as this is a DIY process, Eskom employees will continue to only assist customers that have logged queries and received proper reference numbers”, explained Eskom’s Senior Manager for Customer Services, Portia Papu.

“The process of buying electricity has not changed. Customers will still be able to buy electricity from major banks, online platforms, fuel-filling (service) stations, prepaid electricity vending agents and retailers across the country as they are currently doing,” added Papu.

It is important for customers to take note that should they not recode their meter, the meter will become inactive after 24 November 2024.

PLEASE NOTE: This recoding extends to all STS compliant meters including pre-paid gas and water meters.