Losses from electricity theft were cut by a third in 2014, by far the biggest annual reduction ever registered by the company, Enemalta said yesterday.
And preliminary figures for the first half of 2015 showedthe theft was well below EU average levels.
Referring to a story in The Sunday Times of Malta entitled ‘Magistrate slams Enemalta for “abuse” of its monopoly’, the corporation said it would not comment about the case, since it was subject to pending criminal action.
However, it was committed to continue working to eliminate electricity theft and similar irregularities.
“Between January 2014 and June 2015, over 850 cases of electricity theft, some dating back 10 years, have been concluded, with customers paying for the electricity stolen and applicable fines or signing payment programmes that lead to immediate disconnection of supply in case of default.”
Over 850 cases of electricity theft, some dating back 10 years, have been concluded
It said these results were achieved following the introduction of several measures. The company started focusing on specific types of electricity theft, one by one, to identify how to curb each one of them and then take necessary action accordingly.
“The first of these cases involved the tampering of smart meters – this issue has now been tackled through several measures. Action is now being taken on other irregularities as well,” the company said.
It has specially trained and equipped technicians to identify theft and has acquired new software to monitor consumption patterns and catch irregularities early.
Several anti-theft technologies were also introduced at different stages of the distribution network, some of them designed to automatically suspend the supply to customers as soon as they tried to steal electricity.
The report in Sunday’s paper was about a case of alleged electricity theft in Gozo, in which a man filed a request for an injunction after he was threatened with being cut off unless he paid €9,300. He denied stealing electricity.
The magistrate upheld his request and criticised Enemalta for abusing its dominant position to force clients to renounce their legal rights.