Hydro One is seeking permission to use prepaid meters, a move critics say will only hurt low-income customers.

In a lengthy proposal to the Ontario Energy Board regarding rate increases, Hydro One includes a pitch "to install prepayment meters, which require the customer to pay first before they get any electricity," said New Democrat MPP Peter Tabuns (Toronto-Danforth).

"Everywhere that prepayment meters have been used, they have hurt struggling families," said Tabuns, his party's energy critic, demanding the government ban them, as has happened in the United Kingdom.

Hydro One executives and Energy Minister Glenn Thibeault insist the meters, if approved, would be optional.

The energy board, Thibeault told reporters, is mandated to "have the ratepayers' best interests in mind, and so we leave the decisions, when it comes to rate applications, to the OEB."

Regardless of the type of meter, no one will be cut off from electricity in the winter, he added.

Hydro One's proposal to the OEB states that "one method of enabling customer control of their electricity consumptions, while in arrears condition, and minimizing Hydro One Network's financial risk, is through the use of prepaid meters. Prepaid meters are a type of energy meter that requires users to pay for energy before using it. This is done via a smart card, token or key that can be 'topped up' at a corner shop, via a smartphone application or online.

"For customers who are high collection risk, the financial risk will be minimized by rolling out this type of meter. With a prepaid meter, electricity is paid upfront. Once the prepaid amount is used up, power is cut-off until the customer is able to load the meter with more credits."

Ferio Pugliese, Hydro One's executive vice-president of customer care and corporate affairs, said "absolutely, this will not be forced" on customers and that it is simply providing them more choice.

The meters, he said, are "an option that we had put into our rate filing as another potential option to be available to customers should they choose it."

Pugliese likened it to customers choosing equal billing payments, "where they don't like fluctuations in their bill so they pay a fixed charge." In this case, he said, it could appeal to those "who might be on a different income cycle, who like to prepay everything upfront or through a period of time."

Thibeault said hunters who have camps they use in the fall "might like to see something like this - they can opt-in and have two months of electricity."

However, he also said, the meter request remains "just a thought."

"At the end of the day, we are a still a long way from this even being approved," Thibeault said. "This is just a thought, it's two paragraphs in a 2,000-page document.

But Tabuns believes the meters will circumvent rules preventing electricity cut-offs in the winter.

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"Hydro One's installation of prepayment hydro meters would bypass Ontario's rules for disconnections," Tabuns said. "Hydro One won't have to disconnect anyone; the power will be cut off automatically if the customer doesn't feed the meter."

Thibeault also noted that under Hydro One's filing, future rate increases will be no more "than the cost of inflation for the next four years" and in line with the government's promised 25 per cent reduction in hydro bills.

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