Prepayment meter customers scammed

[Hymie]

There has been a recent news story concerning fraudsters who have cloned prepayment card/keys. Apparently they are offering £50 worth of top-up for £25. The authorities have warned people purchasing these cards/keys that they can detect that the payment was not genuine – so you have to pay for the £50 elecy you stole in the end.

The power companies have not revealed how they know that the top-up was not from a genuine/bona fide source. But if they did, surely they could block the cloned payment card/key from crediting the customer’s meter in the first place.

I don’t have a prepayment meter, but I reckon that the authorities cannot stop or detect this fraud. I would be interested to hear from anyone who has used a dodgy top-up device – and whether the authorities have come calling.

Clearly the power companies should have made the prepayment system more secure from being hacked – they also should have added some additional security feature which could easily be enabled once security was compromised. Adding such an additional security feature would be a simple matter in the original design. Once missed from the original design – it is difficult to effect a patch, which would thwart the fraudsters.

[hc4361]

Anyone who chooses to buy the electricity cheaply knows they are scamming. They deserve everything they get.
Don't forget each key has a code. The company can easily check when it was topped up, by how much and where from.
If there is extra credit showing on the meter they will know.

[Hymie]

Eddie51 – thanks for your elucidation on how the scam works – I was under the impression that it was a simple replacement card/key. Based on your explanation, I would expect everyone who has used this method of top-up to be caught, eventually.

[P_Lactophobe]

The electric company knows how much electricity you paid for at the pay point when you bought the top ups on your account. Once in a while they read the meter - if lots more has been used than has been bought it looks dodgy.
A supervisors key might get the electric on - but that is effectively a loan to stop granny freezing, the kids meal cooked, etc. When the meter is read the tariff on future topups would probably be adjusted to get the money back. Of course the electric company records show when their 'supervisors' hey has been used - if a fraudsters key has been used then there's no record.
No rocket science involved.