ROI Study
Is 1 % of your total KWH sales something worth recovering?
A regular meter maintenance plan can reduce your total cost of metering and increse revenue. Let's say the average consumer on your system uses 1000 KWH per month. At $0.07 per KWH the average light bill for this consumer is going to be $70.00. If the meter is 1% slow the average light bill will be $69.30, which works out to a loss of revenue of $8.40 per year. The cost to calibrate this meter back to 100% registration, at our current field test rates, will pay for itself in less than 2 years.
Regular visits to the meter also provides the opportunity to inspect the service for possible underground settling, voltage problems, tampering, and general deterioration of equipment on a periodic basis. Chapman Metering has a highly trained staff, the newest equipment, the best procedures, and custom software that all combine to make our operation as efficient as possible. Our rates are far more economical than facing the equipment costs and continued cost of education and equipment maintenance for your own meter shop.
Slow meters cost you money. Chapman Metering can help you optimize your meter maintenance plan to recover as much revenue as possible. We have used our decades of meter test experience and our database of hundreds of thousands of meter test records to develop this thorough study.
First, we assembled the graph below showing the percent registration the average meter had after it was calibrated. The most important point to note is that the meter continues to register less and less of the power used over time.
 In our experience, the accuracy of a meter degrades over time as illustrated in the graph above. The most important thing to note is that it degrades faster and faster as the years go by. |
A regular meter test program can make a dramatic difference in reducing the cost of meter slowdowns. The graph below illustrates the effect of calibrating the meter every 5 years instead of every 20 years. The meter still looses accuracy, but it is corrected every five years. The result is the average accuracy over the 20-year period is much higher, which translates directly into reduced losses and improved revenue.
 The difference between the yellow 5-year line and the pink 20 year line illustrates how a regular meter test program can keep your meters more accurate, which will reduce losses. |
To translate the accuracy numbers into a meaningful cost, we take the average annual revenue per meter and multiply it by the difference between the calibrated registration and the calculated registration illustrated in the above graph. Then we added in the cost of recalibrating the meter every so many years and graphed the total accumulated so far.
For the graph below we assumed a $100 per month per meter revenue and a calibrated registration of 100.1% (Chapman Metering standard). The jumps in the yellow line every five years are from the cost of recalibrating.
 This illustrates the benefit after 20 years of an optimal meter test program: Significant Net Revenue Gain |
The total cost of metering is dependent on the losses from inaccuracy and the cost to recalibrate the meter. The actual dollar benefit of making the meter more accurate depends on how much revenue, on average, your meters are responsible for.
| The optimum meter test program is largely dependent on the average revenue per meter. Use this chart to determine the best test cycle for your situation. Find your average monthly revenue per meter along the bottom and then go directly above to the green line if you have the Turtle AMR system or the blue line if you have no AMR. |
Contact Chapman Metering for help setting up a regular meter maintenance program.
Website Design by PPP Design