The Essential Services Commission of Victoria (ESC) has commenced the process of reviewing the consumer and small business protection regulations in Victoria to ensure they adequately take account of the new state of play where manually-read meters are being replaced by remotely-read (smart) electricity meters.

The current regulations were designed to support manually read meters and quarterly billing of customers. However, smart meters will offer the opportunity for meters to be read electronically in 30 minute intervals. This could lead to greater bill complexity should retailers decide to introduce detailed time of day pricing to reduce risk by better reflecting their wholesale purchase costs, some of which can vary in real time.

The objectives of the review are to ensure that:

• Customers are provided with clear information on their electricity consumption and pricing in order for them to make informed decisions about how much power they use and when;
• Customers are protected from accidental remote disconnection of their power supply; and
• Customers with payment difficulties are protected should their billing frequency increase from the current quarterly cycle.

The ESC is requesting submissions from interested parties but you better get moving as the deadline is 24 February 2010. You can read more on the ESC website.