Bill, A customer who causes physical (read, easily detected by the meter reader) damage to a meter is quite possibly deranged. A tamperproof cover will not deter some really "creative" power thieves who cut into the service conduit upstream of the meter and tap into the wires- often to feed a very heavy load such as an electrically-heated spa. I have seen pictures of such "handiwork" where the service mast was cut into at the attic level, so it was not visible to the meter reader. The thief was caught when the meter at the transformer suddenly did not match the sum of the residential meters.
The denial of service is a last-ditch resort of any utility provider, since the County Health Inspector can declare the house to be uninhabitable and cause the residents to be evicted until service is restored and inspected. 73, Eric Lemmon WB6FLY -----Original Message----- From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Bill Smith Sent: Sunday, August 22, 2010 10:25 AM To: [email protected] Subject: Re: [Repeater-Builder] Adding capacitors to lower electric bill The answer is simple. The electric company refuses to provide service to that location. Or, installs a tamperproof cover over the meter, relocates the meter up on the pole, or installs a new electronic meter. They can also go by historical use data for that property and sue the customer for it. ________________________________ From: Chuck Kelsey <[email protected]> To: [email protected] Sent: Sun, August 22, 2010 12:11:38 PM Subject: Re: [Repeater-Builder] Adding capacitors to lower electric bill > Power theft seldom goes undetected, I'll agree. > and the punishment is severe. Not always. I can cite where a customer drilled hole in electric meter glass to allow an object to be inserted to prevent disk from spinning. Case presented to district attorney. No prosecution. Same customer did same thing with water meter later on. Same result with district attorney - no prosecution. Go figure. Chuck WB2EDV
