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Metering

Crossed meters

At multi-tenant sites, one tenant's meter is billed to another tenant's account, so each pays for the other's usage.

How often we find it
Found at roughly 1 in 30 multi-tenant buildings we audit
Typical impact
Often the full difference between two tenants' bills, for months or years

Shopping centers, strip retail, mixed-use buildings and multifamily properties have banks of meters in a shared electrical room, each labeled with a suite or unit number. If a label is wrong, or a meter was swapped during construction or a tenant improvement, the utility's records tie each meter to the wrong premises. The result is a crossed meter: tenant A pays for tenant B's usage and the reverse. Neither notices if the two loads are similar. When they are not, for example a small office crossed with a restaurant, one tenant overpays heavily every month. Crossed meters are also common between a landlord's house meter for common areas and a tenant's meter, and between unit meters in apartment buildings, where the owner may be paying a resident's usage. Because correcting the error shifts charges to another customer, utilities investigate carefully and often limit how far back they will rebill the other party, which affects how much the overpaying tenant recovers.

How it happens

  • Meter labels in a shared meter room were swapped or never updated after a tenant improvement.
  • A meter was replaced and the new meter number was entered on the wrong account.
  • Suites were split or combined and the utility's premise records were not updated.
  • House meters for common areas were set up against tenant suite addresses.

How to detect it

  • Compare each suite's billed load profile to its operating hours: an office billed for usage that peaks at 8 pm is a warning sign.
  • Record meter numbers from the meter faces and match them to the meter numbers printed on each account's bill.
  • Perform a controlled test: switch off a suite's main breaker and confirm which meter stops.
  • Compare billed usage per square foot across similar suites.

Evidence the utility will accept

  • Photographs of each meter face showing the meter number, with the suite label
  • Results of a breaker shutoff test, witnessed by the utility where possible
  • Bills for both affected accounts showing meter numbers and usage
  • Lease or floor plans identifying each suite's area and use

Recovering the overcharge

We request a utility field investigation with the meter photographs and test results. Once the utility confirms the cross, it corrects the meter assignments and rebills both accounts. The overpaying customer is typically refunded for the period allowed by the utility's tariff or state back-billing rules, while the other party's catch-up bill may be limited by separate rules, so the refund and the rebill are not always symmetrical.

Questions we get asked

Usually, within the limits of the utility's tariff and state rules. Those limits sometimes protect the under-billed customer more than they limit your refund.

A licensed electrician or the building engineer, ideally with the utility present. The test must be coordinated with both tenants.

Yes. It is one of the more common patterns, and it often surfaces when common area lighting or HVAC shows up on a tenant's bill.

Find this error in your own bills.

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from bill access to first findings report
21 daysfrom bill access to first findings report
of filed claims accepted by the utility in full or in part
94%of filed claims accepted by the utility in full or in part