Meter reading & billing

This guide provides information about your meter, how it is read and how it is used to provide accurate billing for your electricity usage.

Your meter

• Your meter records how many units of electricity you use 
• This is measured in ‘kilowatt-hours’ (kWh) 
• Meters are usually very accurate and faults are very rare
• Your tariff depends on the kind of meter installed, for example Popular, Nightsaver or Weekender

Meter reading

NIE Networks’ meter readers call every three months (quarterly). If they don’t get a reading during their visit they will leave a card for you to provide your own reading within 24 hours, otherwise an estimate will be used.

Estimated readings are based on past billing history and are usually accurate. If you think an estimated bill is not accurate please contact us with your own readings.

For help with reading your meter click here

Bills

We subtract your previous reading from your present reading to work out how many units you have used. We then calculate your bill using the following tariff rates and charges:

• Units – the amount of electricity you have used
• Standing charge – a fixed charge that does not vary with the amount used
• Climate Change Levy - a tax on electricity used in business premises (5% VAT customers are exempt)
• VAT – usually 20%, but this reduces to 5% if on average you use less than 33 units a day. More information is available here

High bills

When an unexpected high bill arrives, many customers suspect that their meter may be faulty, but this is very rarely the case. The most common reasons for a higher bill are:

• You may be comparing a winter bill to a summer bill
• It may be a ‘catch up’ bill following a low estimated reading last quarter
• Your operating hours may have changed
• You have had new equipment fitted for example heating, air conditioning, refrigeration etc
• If you are worried about a high bill please contact us with your own meter reading and we will be happy to investigate it for you.

Cancelled bills

Following a series of estimated bills, we sometimes get an actual meter reading that is lower than the estimated readings used on previous bills. In order to correct this we will:

• cancel the previous bills until we reach one with a lower reading than your latest reading 
• credit you with any payments you have made on the cancelled bills
• re-calculate your new bill, for electricity used since the lower reading 

(Please be aware that the new bill may include multiple standing charges if the period is more than one quarter)

Online account

Enjoy paperless billing with a Power NI online account. We’ll even give you an extra 2% discount* for helping us protect the environment by using less paper and ‘postage miles’. 

*Applies to quarterly-billed customers. Other discounts apply for monthly-billed users