Electricity giant AusNet Services plans to ask for a forecast $350 million extra from hundreds of thousands of customers over the next 15 years.
It overspent $70 million last year, and wants to pass on most of it. And it forecasts a further $280 million blowout by the end of next year.
It has applied to increase next year’s charges for the most common smart meter to $208.87 plus GST — $51.27 more than had been approved.
It blames the cost blowout on a public revolt against meter installations, government reviews that delayed the rollout, and major information technology system faults.
AusNet Services covers 670,000 customers in Melbourne’s eastern suburbs and the state’s east and northeast.
The smart meter rollout, ordered by the Labor government and continued by the Coalition after a review, is already costing Victorian households and small businesses a total of about $2.4 billion.
The Australian Energy Regulator, which allows excess expenditure claims to be passed on to consumers only if costs are “prudent and efficient”, has rejected previous technology cost-recovery attempts from AusNet Services.
The Consumer Action Law Centre said that unreasonable cash grabs had to be resisted.
“This company seems to have continual blowouts in expenditure, and expects consumers to foot the bill,” spokesman Gerard Brody said.
Jemena’s proposed smart meter charge for next year is $231.28, $11.38 more than previously approved. United Energy wants to charge $160.44, down $4.58 on previous plans.
Proposals for a $115.49 CitiPower and $108.96 Powercor fee are lower than forecast.
The regulator is reviewing the company’s requests.
Documents submitted to the regulator reveal United Energy overspent $53.5 million last year, and Jemena $25.7 million. But they said their total project costs and charges remained close to budget because of earlier lower-than-expected spending.
Karen Collier, Herald Sun
Via: A smart meter cost blowout threatens to add up to $520 more to many power bills
Stop Smart Meters Australia 
SO sick of this parasite Globalist NWO Tyranny which Tony Abbot plays his part in. It’s time to sign a petition against Smart Meters so here’s the link.
http://www.change.org/p/government-power-companies-people-are-being-forced-from-their-homes-give-us-a-choice-to-remove-refuse-the-smart-meter?tk=IkqxaaGXJAdiNZQg8Y58yRe-AD95hCeYMyekl5LYUhs&utm_source=petition_update&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=petition_update_email
Here’s the story cut n past from that link…
Petition by fiona shanti Australia
In a country such as Australia you expect to feel safe in your home, you expect the Government and authorities to provide protection, and perhaps above all you expect to have a right of choice over matters both large and small that affect your life. Unfortunately for me these beliefs and my life have been turned on its head courtesy of the Government mandating the power companies to use their ‘best endeavours’ to install smart meters on my home and all the homes & businesses in Victoria.
Last night I lay in bed clutching my chest as electric shock type sensations surged through me. This has been a normal occurrence since the installation of a smart meter onto my home. Previously my house had been my sanctuary, now it is my hell. I have become sleep deprived through regular painful shocks to my head, my heart and my bones. I have head pain, bone pain and chest pain, heart palpitations, burning eyes and so on. I start each day in a zombie like state of tiredness, pain and disorientation.
These are all common symptoms for someone considered electro sensitivity and from my encounters with others I have come to learn that thousands of people have been affected. It is claimed that 3% of the population have this sensitivity and with the saturation of ‘smart’ technology and wi fi this number will only increase. This figure accords with my experience and conversations with others for whom the introduction of the smart meter was a life changing event of the very worst type.
My Doctor told me to get out of my house even if I had to sleep in the park. While I have tried this I ask, ‘should I have to leave my home to feel safe?! ‘She said I have a tremor on my brain and high levels of radiation which matched the symptoms experienced. Now the symptoms are chronic and each day is a struggle. Letters to the local, state and federal politicians, the energy company and the energy minister go unheard while they send letters of response advising that the authorities assure them smart meters are safe! Meanwhile I have had to re-mortgage my home and spend most of my income to pay for protective devises and medical bills.
My request to have the ‘smart’ meter removed has been refused, and my rights to health and to live safely in my own home are ignored. I am now facing the only action I can take which is to sell my home and join the many others who have already been forced to shift interstate where this curse has at least for the moment not yet spread. This smart meter is making me ill and causing me to leave my job, my loved ones and community behind. It is hard to believe this is happening in Australia. The Government is actually creating refugees in their own country.
While the authorities assure us ‘smart’ meters are safe the outdated Australian standards do not cover long term non thermal effects. These Australian standards are far behind the rest of the world and the smart meter on my house has not even been through a certification process.
The truth is that smart meter programs have encountered problems and challenges from those suffering ill health throughout the world. The roll out has had to be halted in many countries in the face of opposition and human rights concerns, and yet in Victoria the authorities blithely assure us that everything is OK.
I would contend that everything is far from OK. Research shows ‘smart’ meters are unsafe. Emissions given off by smart meters have even been classed as a possible human carcinogenic by the World Health Organisation. Other countries have ‘woken up’ and stopped the roll out or at the very least given people a choice. Why can’t Australia? Have we really become a country of bullies and fools!
Of course there are a range of other issues with the smart meter. These can be considered further at stopsmartmeters.com.au. However, my focus here is on the ignorance surrounding the roll out of the ‘smart’ meter, and refusal to listen to those adversely affected by this decision and the obvious health issues.
Please sign my petition to tell the Government, power companies installing the smart meters to wake up to common sense and let people have a choice to refuse the installation of the ‘smart’ meter and/or have them removed.
Please send this petition to your email list and social media and help me get this smart meter removed so I can live in peace, regain my health and even get a good night sleep!
As I’ve been saying for many months now, this NWO (New World Order) is actually part of the UN’s Agenda 21, which seeks to control every aspect of our lives and has been signed by 178 different countries. Look it up!
So the distributor’s have overspent. Can’t they budget? Perhaps they can sell all the smart meters they have left at a garage sale. Or they could make some changes at work.
Give the employees smart meters for Xmas presents. Instead of a bonus, give a smart meter as a gift..Instead of a Xmas party have a smart meter party. Play smart meter games. Play smart meter drinking games. Eat your meals on a smart meter.
Decorate the Xmas tree with smart meters. Kiss a smart meter under the mistletoe.
These ideas can help the distributors save money.
On Mon, 1 Oct 2012 12:05:51 +0400, I received an email from Professor Yuri Grigoriev, Chairman of Russian National Committee on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection. I had written to the Professor to ask about the safety of smart meters since i can’t get answers in this country. His reply was,
Smert meters is not present in Russia and I have no big interest to this problem.
In Russia there is a standard 10 µ W|sm2 for the population (Russian Standard. 2003. SanPiN 2.1.8/2.24.1190-03. Hygienic requirements for the siting and operation of land mobile radio communication equipment. Moscow:
Russian Federation (in Russian).
Herald Sun seems to only be interested in the financial side of things, a very narrow-minded approach when you think about it. I tried to comment with factual information on health and safety issues…. doubt there is any freedom of speech allowed. It seems Karen Collier is still unable (or unwilling?) to report on ALL the important facts. No doubt she would be well aware of the many, many problems by now…
Probably not Karen’s fault. After all she is told what to do and say by her boss (Rupe Murdoch). His connections must include those high up in the microwave industry.
Blaming the cost blowout on consumer resistance to the installation must say something even to the most feeble intellectually challenged. The people do not want it, that is the clear message and it seems that instead of ignoring the laws the Victorian parliament should rescind its attempt to impose smart meters on the people. Better yet, return the power utilities to the public ownership as it was unlawfully stolen from the people, in breach of our rights and no compliance with the Commonwealth constitution, the Commonwealth Weights and Measures Act, Commonwealth ?Crimes Act 1914 and the Consumer and Competition Acts as well as probably breaching International Human Rights, etc. Our parliaments continue with their rogue behaviour and it is time to call a stop and regain the lawful government (you and I) with parliament being our servant
John it is an absolute insult for the utilities to rub further salt into wound by attempting to impose monetary demand upon those very people that they first bullied and harassed mercilessly and un-endingly and whose human rights they have utterly violated. If they are allowed to do this then I can only conclude government regulatory bodies in Australia to be part of one big Mafia.
The problem is not so much the regulators who rule on the monetary amounts only, but the whole government setup enabling this dirty collaboration between government and the power utilities, and which setup is able to facilitate the actual introduction these illicit charges (ie. the extortion of those customers that they have already “bullied, harassed” and whose lives they have turned upside down) in a way as somehow having legitimacy.
We will at the forthcoming elections when we all vote PPV.
What will happen to our bills? The people like me who are lucky enough to not have a smart meter, do we have to keep paying for something we dont have? How can they charge me for nothing? Its not right. We should start a class action against them for charging us for something we dont have as I thought thats robbery and illegal.
Rik,
You are quite right ! The robber barons tied to this Smart Meter or not so smart meter fiasco from the beginning are, I allege to be Mr Geoff Kennett of the Victorian Liberal party circa 1994 and of course the past John Brumby Labor Victorian government and the now not so liberal party of Victorian Liberal party, starting with the over-thrown Mr Ted Baillieu and now enthroned incumbent Mr Denis Napthine and his Victorian Ministers for Energy and Resources from the now disgraced Mr Michael O’Brien to the also disgraced Mr Nicholas Kotsiras and now incumbent ex football player Mr Russell Northe.
All of these I allege to be robber barons are, out to continually rob us all. Me-thinks they are in the pay of similarly corrupt powers as was Bad King John in thirteenth (13 Century England ) and his ilk, the modern equivalent being the five Electric power companies either Chinese or Singapore owned bar one Australian owned, and all I allege robber barons.
Starting with Mr Geoff Kennett was the beginning of the reign of these cruel and also I allege to be corrupt-hearted, weak and evil robber-barons compliant to their also corrupt bosses so named above.
So Ausnet blames everyone but themselves. Public revolt, most people don’t want to die so it is understandable that a revolt has taken place.
POOR POOR AUSNET HOW DARE PEOPLE REVOLT AGAINST A POSSIBLE CANCER CAUSING DEVICE. They need their license taken off them, but even that is not enough. They should be made to sleep in a room full of smart meters. Hopefully in jail.
Minnie, Ausnet and her crony sisters actually made threats against literally tens of thousands of Victorians to cut off their power. And yes I’ll repeat that number without any exaggeration whatsoever…..tens of thousands…..just unimaginable. You do know of that very decent lady Sofia who had her power switched off and has was made to live in the dark by that nasty and cruel organisation being the electricity distrubution company in her area called United Energy.
You are on the right track with your comment but as far as I am concerned each of the respective CEO’s of the five electricity distribution companies (both past and present) should be made to live the rest of their lives in 24/7 gross darkness never to see a spec of light again and with two transmitting smart meters permanently strapped to each side of their head. That’s what these scoundrels have attempted to do to us so it shouldn’t do them any harm at all should it……. ?
Eric, I visited Sophia and as I told you, her place was so cold. Imagine having to live like that for 6 months. I met her daughter and this distressed me even more as this young girl also had to live in these conditions.
Anyone involved in what has happened needs to be penalized. I hear Evin Prison in Tehran is not the most pleasant place to be incarcerated.
These greedy and despotic corporate traders have had no qualm and no conscience to inflict psychological trauma upon common people including men, women, children, babies, families, mothers, fathers, the frail, the elderly, the medically disadvantaged. These despots have not discriminated against anyone in their reign of terror. They say that what goes around comes around, in which case the day of their own terrors is surely coming to bite them in the backside HARD !!!!
Eric, you are so right! Your comments are brilliant as usual. Thank you!
Minnie, well said! My thoughts exactly… you’re doing a terrific job and we need more like you!!
Why should we pay for these companies incompetence in running a project. Any other company would have to wear the costs, not the consumer, and so should ausnet.
We have given them enough money to install the meters we dontvwant or need and they should be barred from going back to the well for more money
We don’t have to wear the costs. We never gave consent and if we did not give consent, we are not responsible for any costs. You would have to have a contract to be responsible for any costs.
It is the same if you buy a car on loan, then you can’t pay the money back. They would have to try and recover the losses from the person who signed the contract. If this was not possible, then they would have to wear the loss.
They are responsible for their own losses, not the people. They picked their own possible cancer causing devices and therefore are responsible for all costs, not the people.
Given the non-consensual nature of these spy meters, and the fact that the customer loses a lot and gains nothing from them, and given the fact that the companies appear not to be passing on any cost savings claimed to be part of the deal, it is nothing less than fraud for these companies to want to force us to pay for these non-consensual, health-endangering impositions.
AusNet would also won’t to try to slug consumers for law suit that has been approved for Black Saturday victims where it started in Kilmore East and affected more than that community. As people may know it spread to Humevale, Kinglake areas and Flowerdale and others. So as I see it they want to double dip. Flowerdale residents already have high fees for power they have set (yep enquired recently with other power companies to supply me bills and rates).