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Thursday, August 20, 2015

Save On Cost With Automated Meter Reading Billing Software

By Nancy Gardner


Most of water of water, gas and electricity providers have started to recognize the value of using modern technology on their daily works to save on cost and reduce the distance staff have to travel to collect information. Collection of raw date from meters is automated and electronically relayed back to the central station where it is worked upon. The benefit associated with automated meter reading billing software obviously outweighs the limitations.

This real time data which is then processed to produce meaningful information can be helpful to utility providers and their clients, this is because they can control production and consumption of gas usage and production, water consumption and production and consumption of electric energy.

The first type is the handheld device which is a computerized gadget used record the gauge status and transmitting the data back to central station for analyzing. There is a host computer that uses various software to manipulate data into useful information.

Some of these automated devices are touch based devices which is simultaneously used together with handheld device. It has probe which when it come into contact with any meter it can automatically take the reading, record them in a laptop which then transmits the data collected to a central station.

One type of handheld device is keypad entry where readers of these gauge read them manually and key in their readings in a handheld device. The reader then has to go back to the station and give the device to a clerk who downloads the device recorded data into electronic software for billing. This method is cost effective if applied in smaller cities where there are no many users to allow them benefit from time saving advantage of this device.

Automated reader has converted physical, labor intensive commercial, residential and industrial collection of data to a simple exercise with little physical movement by use of computerized devices to collect data with minimal supervision. This has cut down expense associated with meter maintenance, eliminated errors in the system and the chances of malicious data manipulation, fastened data transmission and enable accurate information to be relayed to customers.

Another automated device that is in operation is the use of radio network frequency which comes in many forms. The common ones involve satellite and solutions based on fixed network.

This system removes tedious and long procedures for of collecting and sending data to main office for processing. This consolidates the whole process, maximize a firm return on investment, and facilitate division of labor in the firm and to quickly and easily come up with routes through interaction with already existing customer information and systems for billing.

This is not to mean that it does not support a single fixed rate for individual users. Demand billing and time billing are not handled by this program. Automated billing software can perform data logging as well and it advisable for energy providers to consider using them.




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