| Deorali & Tadong | 8967122527 |
| Rest of Gangtok | 9907544248 |
| Ranipool | 8116553309 |
| Rangpo | 7477811574 |
| Singtam | 8967163741 |
| Gyalshing | 8159035379 |
| Mangan | 9635812722 |
| Jorethang | 7076950913 |
| Namchi | 9564096659 |
As the name implies, a prepaid electricity meters requires you to pay for your energy in advance. Prepaid energy meters allow you to control your energy consumption, making it possible to check the remaining balance and top-up if necessary.
Prepaid energy meter works exactly like your prepaid mobile connection. The consumer buys a recharge voucher and inputs the code provided in the voucher into the prepaid energy meter through a device called Customer Interface Unit (CIU) that comes attached with your prepaid energy meter. Once this is done, the consumer gets credited energy units equal to the value of the recharge voucher. The credit balance will keep reducing for every unit of energy consumed and once zero, the power supply would be automatically cut off*.
* For your convenience, consumers are provided emergency credit and friendly credit. Please read on to find out.
It can be explained by the simple schematic provided below:
With a view to incentivize our consumers, the Government has approved the following for all prepaid consumers:
a) Freedom from monthly bills: No more unexpected huge electricity bill. The pay-as-you-go system will allow you to buy electricity only when it is required. You are the boss! No mandatory monthly electricity bills. You, and not somebody else, get to decide when to pay and how much to pay. All you have to do is plan your electricity usage to suit your needs.
b) Conveniently re-charge your meter: The system can provide complete flexibility of purchasing electricity online or through physical vending counter in banks. We recommend online purchase through the Sahaj Liberty App of Secure Meters Ltd. which can be downloaded from your smartphone’s app store. However, past experience in Gangtok, Rangpo, Singtam and Jorethang have demonstrated that more than 95% of our esteemed consumers still prefer to visit the bank to make electricity payments even when online option is available. In deference to the preference of our consumers, we have ensured that you can buy recharge tokens from State Bank of Sikkim branches in your towns too. The same SBS counter which receives electricity bill payment will also sell you the recharge tokens. We intend to expand this facility to other banks in the near future for added convenience of our consumers.
c) Do your own budgeting: The prepaid system will encourage our customers to understand the cost of energy and thus empower them to budget their usage in accordance to their means and needs. It is very easy to track energy consumption and be aware of your energy usage. This may help you change your usage habits and save at least 20% on energy consumption. Another significant advantage of a prepaid energy meter is that you can decide how much money you want to spend for your energy usage and cut down on energy consumption accordingly.
Prepaid energy meters allow you to calculate your daily usage and manage your account. As an energy customer, you will be able to view your current balance and estimated usage for the days ahead.
e) Helps you become energy conscious: A large percentage of the population in our country are often not aware of the fact that misuse of electricity leads to detrimental effect upon environment in the long run. Conscious and responsible usage of electricity will help save your finances and will also go on to save the environment. A win-win deal!
There are two options to recharge your prepaid energy meters.
a) State Bank of Sikkim – You can buy recharge vouchers at the same counter of State Bank of Sikkim where you have been paying your electricity bills.
b) Online – Please download Sahaj Liberty App from Google Play or Apple App Store and install on your smartphone, following which you can recharge your meter online.
These circumstances are common and can potentially happen to anybody. We may not have recharged in time and the available credit has run out. Well, please do not worry! Your meter is programmed not to disconnect supply during such periods. It is for your convenience that the concept of EMERGENCY CREDIT and FRIENDLY CREDIT is there in case of prepaid energy meters.
Forgot to recharge? Once your credit runs out, your meter will disconnect your electricity supply automatically. However, you can press any button on the Customer Interface Unit (CIU) to temporarily restore the supply. For this purpose, an emergency credit of Rs. 200/- for domestic supply, Rs. 1000/- for commercial supply and Rs. 10,000/- for bulk supply shall be available to you by default. Depending upon the category of supply relevant to you, you can use electricity up to the credit amount specified. You should now recharge your prepaid meter immediately so that there is no further disruption in your supply.
When you subsequently recharge, emergency credit will be restored from the recharge value.
Run out of emergency credits during odd hours and you are unable to recharge your meter? If you run out of emergency credit during the week after 4:15 pm, electricity supply will not switch-off until 9:45 am the following day. If your emergency credit runs out at any time during the weekend or pre-declared holidays, the electricity supply will not switch-off off until 9:45 am of the subsequent working day. The consumption during this period shall be adjusted when you recharge subsequently.
Your prepaid energy meter will hold a maximum credit of Rs. 30,000/- for all categories. What does this mean? It means, if you do not have any credit in the meter, you can recharge the meter for a maximum of Rs. 30,000/-. Let us explain with an example. Say you have consumed electricity equivalent to Rs. 12,000/- subsequent to recharge of Rs. 30,000/-, you can now recharge the energy prepaid meter with a maximum of Rs. 18,000/-.
No, refund will not be possible once the recharge voucher is generated.
Yes, of course you can. You can contact the issuing bank for the same.
Wait for 15 minutes and thereafter if the power is not resumed, please contact the helpline number. The helpline numbers are as follows:
| Deorali & Tadong | 8967122527 |
| Rest of Gangtok | 9907544248 |
| Ranipool | 8116553309 |
| Rangpo | 7477811574 |
| Singtam | 8967163741 |
| Gyalshing | 8159035379 |
| Mangan | 9635812722 |
| Jorethang | 7076950913 |
| Namchi | 9564096659 |
We shall be adding the helpline numbers for other towns too as prepaid meter installation progresses.
You may receive a code with more than 20 digits if there is a change in the tariff. Please ensure that you enter all the digits in that code one after the other in correct sequence.
What does it mean? K.B. lock means key board lock. The keypad is locked when you enter the recharge code incorrectly five times in a row. If this happens, wait for 30 seconds and try again.
Your prepaid energy meter will hold a maximum credit of Rs. 30,000/- for all categories. What does this mean? It means, if you do not have any credit in the meter, you can recharge the meter for a maximum of Rs. 30,000/-. Let us explain with an example. Say you have consumed electricity equivalent to Rs. 12,000/- subsequent to recharge of Rs. 30,000/-, you can now recharge the energy prepaid meter with a maximum of Rs. 18,000/-.
Press button ‘1’ to see the number of days before your account balance will run out. This forecast is based on your energy usage cost over the last seven days.
If you plan to move house, it is best to recharge only as much as you need. Visit the concerned Power Department office to settle the issue. Refund however will not be possible.
Press button ‘7’ of the customer interface unit (CIU) to view month-wise consumption cost for the previous 12 months.
Keypad functions are as shown below:
In order to increase the balance in your account you must enter a vending token. This token (vend code) is provided to you for the money paid. Generally, this is a twenty, thirty, forty, fifty, sixty, seventy or eighty digit code. The Vending code entry page ‘ENTER TKN’ allows entering a vending code.
A vend code can be entered in maximum four lines with each line allowing you to enter twenty digits of the vend code.
For example,say your vend token has the following code:
77875 42423 87123 55878
28585 28570 27260 36686
In order to enter this code into your prepaid meter, you will need to perform the following sequence of actions:
It is recommended that you set up an alarm for Low Credit or Low Money. Here is how you do that!
