“WHEN YOU LEAVE, DON'T FORGET TO TURN OFF THE LIGHTS AND TURN ON THE ELECTRIC METER.”

“What? Oh yeah, that special switch near the electrical panel. OK. I got it; will do.”

Is this a conversation your customers have at the end of the day? No. Are you sure? You can be. This scenario could already be happening with your customers via meter tampering. Do you have a system in place to identify such tampering?

When an automated meter reading (AMR) system is installed, some customers become more savvy and creative in their attempts to save money by tampering with their electric meters. PECO (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S.) has been able to outpace even the most unscrupulous customers by leveraging data from its AMR system to identify potential theft and tamper conditions.

In 2004, PECO completed the deployment of a fixed network AMR system from Cellnet (Alpharetta, Georgia, U.S.). The PECO AMR network currently reads more than 2.2 million meters daily. This system is designed to deliver both energy consumption and meter-data tamper flags such as reverse rotation, magnetic fields, outage notification/restoration and outage counts.

Prior to deploying an AMR system, revenue protection teams relied on traditional methods to identify meter tampering and potential theft. The meter readers who checked the meters each month were the front-line forces. Beyond the meter reader, techniques such as proactive sweeps and irregular usage investigations were used. Additionally, hot lines and tips are good sources of tampering leads.

PECO no longer uses meter readers as a result of the AMR implementation. While this has eliminated a key identifier of theft, PECO still relies on other traditional methods of theft detection and resolution.

PECO's revenue protection organization conducts proactive area sweeps where theft is suspected or has occurred before. During a proactive area sweep, field personnel physically inspect all services in a specific geographic area. While some theft is identified and resolved, the deterrent value of a visible PECO presence is effective.

Resolving theft at a specific premise is only the first step. PECO also investigates any other premise that might be associated with that thief. This collateral investigation ensures all theft associated with an individual is detected and corrected.

Once the AMR system was installed, PECO quickly realized its need for new, intelligent methods to identify theft and energy diversion. The focus turned to the AMR system.

AMR meters provide various flags and indicators of theft. Reverse rotations, outage-count indicators, unplanned outage notifications and usage on previously cut meters all identify good targets for field investigations. AMR indicators are often corroborated by reports from PECO customers that theft is occurring near their premises.

Throughout the past year, PECO has been working with Cellnet to design several reports that identify conditions indicative of meter tampering. These reports guide the field revenue protection forces in deciding which premises require on-site inspection. This effort has yielded significant improvements over traditional meter investigation methods. Furthermore, there is a measurable increase in metered usage and associated revenue for those meters that have been successfully investigated (Fig. 1).

These reports were piloted during June and July of 2005. Field visits were used to validate the veracity of the reports. The pilot reports successfully identified tampering on 70% of the meters targeted. For many of the remaining 30% where tampering was not validated, usage increased after a field visit by an investigator.

Based on this success, PECO integrated these reports into its existing revenue-protection processes. Cellnet delivers the reports on a monthly or as-needed basis. The reports continue to be successful; so far, theft has been validated at 90% of the premises identified.

• The Unplanned Outage Report identifies meters where there are numerous or excessive unplanned outages. This report identifies meters with greater than 10 outages occurring during a 30-day period but is not designed to look for specific patterns. In this case, a customer has likely installed an illegal switch that, when activated, reduces or eliminates the flow of electricity through the meter register. This sequence is illustrated in Fig. 2. Approximately 40% of the theft identified by the AMR reports is identified with this report.

• PECO uses a four-day billing window. Any reading obtained during this window can be used for billing purposes. The Billing Window Report identifies a meter that is turned off either outside of the billing window or during the billing window. Customers who choose to turn off the meter outside the billing window may be trying to convince PECO that the limited usage recorded during the billing window reflects usage for the entire billing period. This sequence is identified in Fig. 3. Customers who choose to turn off their meters during the billing window may be trying to force PECO to estimate their bill. Such customers may hope that the estimate will be low and will reflect less than actual usage. This sequence is identified in Fig. 4. Approximately 35% of the theft identified by AMR reports is identified with this report.