20180703 (Tue)
What if I am accused of stealing electricity by tampering with the electric meter?
You probably have been told of incidences when the utility company sends you a bill costing more than RM500 being a fine for tampering with the electric meter of your house.
What? I do NOT even have access to the Electric Riser Room! In most condo and apartments, the electric meters are housed inside a special room. The management corporation is the authority holding the keys. And, in fact, there is another layer of safety by the utility company that house the meters inside an enclosure (usually a metal cabinet) locked away.
Yet, you can be accused of changing the meter reading, or slowing down the meter rate to “steal electricity”. In many occasions, you do NOT know and NEVER was INTERESTED in how this meter looks like in your whole life!
The outcome of your appeal will take a long time, years in fact. This is probably two steps mechanism. First to see if some would just pay the fine, despite them knowing if there was indeed any justification of why such accusation was thrown onto the house owner. Second, there is a need to establish the evidence that stealing electricity was the motive of such break-in to tamper with the meter.
If the investigation cannot prove that the meter was tampered with, then the accusation of stealing electricity could not be established. Nevertheless, there is no way you could argue that the meter was indeed NEVER tampered with. You have no access to the meter (as now it is kept by the utility company). And, even if there is a defect over years of use (wear and tear), you CANNOT uncover such possibility and defend yourself.
The only solution to this is keep on making appeals and complaints of this unjust accusation (if there was no such tampering act). The tribunal under the government agency shall give their verdict.