Juan C from New Orleans, LA. Got a weird one. Client runs a commercial laundry serving hotels in the French Quarter. Entergy bills show the exact same meter reading for 8 consecutive months — 45,872 kWh. Exact same number. That is not an estimate, the bills show ACT for actual read. But there is zero chance a commercial laundry consuming exactly 45,872 kWh every single month for 8 months. I think the meter is stuck or dead and the reader is just writing down whatever is on the register without noticing it has not moved.
Stuck meter reading the same number for 8 months
Juan, a stuck meter register is a real thing, especially on older electromechanical meters. The disc can still spin but the register gears can jam, so the display never advances. The meter reader sees numbers and writes them down. Nobody catches it because the billing system sees actual reads and does not flag zero consumption. Your theory is almost certainly correct.
I had a stuck meter case in Baton Rouge on an Entergy account. Restaurant, similar situation — same reading for 5 months. Entergy replaced the meter and did a bench test on the old one. The register was indeed jammed. They rebilled the 5 months based on the prior 12-month average. Recovery for the client was about $800 because they had been underbilled. But here is the twist — the client also had a stuck meter on a DIFFERENT account that was reading HIGH. Net across both accounts they were overpaying.
Marie that is interesting — a stuck meter reading too high. How does that work mechanically?
The register gears can slip and advance faster than the actual disc rotation. Rare but it happens. In that case the meter was reading about 115% of actual usage. Entergy confirmed it on the bench test.
Juan, for your situation the critical question is whether the client has been underbilled or overbilled during the stuck period. If the meter register is not advancing, the billing system thinks consumption is zero (current read minus previous read = 0). So either Entergy has been billing zero and the client has been getting free electricity for 8 months, or Entergy is using some other method to generate the bills.
Nancy, that is what is confusing me. The bills show 45,872 as the reading every month, but the billed kWh is NOT zero. Each bill shows approximately 38,000-42,000 kWh of consumption. I think the billing system is calculating consumption some other way — maybe from the smart meter communication data rather than the register display. The register is stuck but the actual metering element might still be working.
That makes sense if it is a newer meter with both a digital register and an electronic measurement element. The billing system might be pulling data from the electronic side while the display is frozen. In that case the billed amounts could be correct even though the register display is wrong. You need Entergy to confirm which data source the billing system is using.
Called Entergy. They confirmed the meter has both an electronic measurement module and a display register. The billing system uses the electronic module data. The display register froze 8 months ago but the actual consumption measurement has been working fine. So the bills are probably accurate. False alarm on the billing side, but I told the client to request a meter replacement anyway because a frozen display means they cannot verify their own usage.
Good outcome even though it was not a billing error. The client now knows their meter needs replacement and you demonstrated thoroughness. That builds trust for future work. Not every audit produces a refund but every audit should produce value.