Your Prepaid Meter Has Stopped Accepting Newly Purchased Tokens. Now What?

If the date is on or after 24 November 2023 then the problem is most likely a Token Identifier (TID) fault and you will need to update your prepaid meter (electricity, water or gas) by purchasing more units and following the instructions printed on your receipt.

“Currently installed prepaid meters will automatically cease to work by 24 November 2023 owing to a date rollover problem, unless each individual meter is updated. This means residents will no longer be able to load electricity, water or gas on them after the said deadline,” says Straton Prepaid.

“The Token Identifier (TID) rollover programme updates all prepaid meters.

NB: Tokens that were purchased but not utilised before the deadline will be rendered invalid. The amount in the meter will not be erased and will be carried over Only the meter key will be changed, and the TID memory reset to all zeros.

ALL you Need to Know:

To update, when making the first purchase of electricity after the system rollover date, a client will receive a receipt with three tokens on it that need to be entered in the sequence as printed on the receipt. The update takes about two minutes to process. This change will affect all prepaid meters with 11 digits.

Background:

On 24 November 2024 all prepayment meters based on STS technology will stop dispensing electricity, thus presenting a significant risk to the service levels of all sub-metering vendors to end-user customers in the electricity, water and gas utilities business.

Each credit token has a unique token identifier (TID) encoded into the 20 digits to prevent token replay at the meter. The TID is referenced to a base date of 1993 and will run out of range in 2024 (known as the TID Rollover event), thus causing the prepayment meter to stop accepting new tokens.

The technical remedy is to “reset” each meter to reference a new base date of 2014 by means of entering two (2) special tokens before November 2024. This requires a substantial time, effort and resource loading on the part of the sub-metering vendor, so it is imperative that the remedial action process commences as a matter of urgency.

What Is A Token ID (TID)?

A TID is a token identification code used to uniquely identify each token that is generated. When a meter accepts a token, it stores the TID in order to prevent the same token of being accepted more than once. At the time of creation of the token, the TID is calculated as the number of minutes that have elapsed since a given base date.

Should your meter have been installed before 2014 you MAY have to take additonal steps or replace the meter.

Find more Prepaid Meter Error Codes and Solutions here: https://straton.co.za/pre-paid/about/prepaid-meter-error-codes/

A Practical Example:

The Key Change Token – KCT – (two sets of 20 digits) will be shown on the slip with the next purchase followed by the vend token. This means that the client will receive 3 sets of tokens that need to be entered into the meter in the correct sequence.

NB: Any old tokens need to be entered into the meter before the KCT is entered. Meter Results will vary from different brands. Every meter brand will show a different result when the token is accepted!

1st Set (TID Token 1)
Punch in the token value given – Not all 0’s as illustrated:
“0000 0000 0000 0000 0000” – Press “# or Enter” (bottom right button on your Meter), it will show on screen (KCT 1 Accepted!)

2nd Set (TID Token 2)
Punch in the token value given – Not all 0’s as illustrated:
“0000 0000 0000 0000 0000” – Press “# or Enter”, it will show on screen (KCT 2 Accepted!) wait for it until it shows Units again.

3rd Set (Purchased Value Token)
Punch in the token value given – Not all 0’s as illustrated:
“0000 0000 0000 0000 0000” – Press “Enter”, it will show on screen (Kwh Value Accepted, then your units will increase)

It’s Done. Your Prepaid Meter is now Upgraded.

Video: Your Prepaid Meter Has Stopped Accepting Newly Purchased Tokens. Now What?

Boilerplate and Editor’s Notes.
More Info on Your Prepaid Meter Has Stopped Accepting Newly Purchased Tokens. Now What? here:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/MyPE
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/StratonElectrical/

CLICK HERE to submit your press release to MyPR.co.za.