Streamlining Ops: 5 Hidden Costs of Manual Recharges

Wasted time, admin overload and fee creep – these are the hidden costs of manual recharges for property teams, and how to streamline your ops instead.

If you’re still buying electricity one meter at a time, you’re not alone.

Many property and infrastructure managers still rely on time-consuming manual processes: Sending staff to physical stores, logging into banking apps daily with spend limits or juggling multiple small vendors, each with their own system and limited meter coverage.

This manual mess might seem manageable... until something slips. A student building loses power. A high-end guest leaves a bad review. Or your team’s entire Friday afternoon disappears trying to fix a top-up failure.

These are just some of the real-world stories from Prepaid24’s business clients, all of whom discovered the hidden costs of manual recharges and how to avoid them, streamlining ops to a smarter, centralised system for power management.

Here’s what you shouldn’t be paying extra for when recharging…

5 Hidden Costs of Manual Recharges Ops Teams Should Know

Manual processes aren’t just a nuisance; they’re actively costing your business.

And not just in Rands.

1. Time is money, and it's being wasted

When a staff member drives to a store to top up meters, that’s hours lost to logistics instead of high-value work. Factor in the time for queues, failed transactions and travel, and suddenly it’s an entire workday – gone.

2. Admin overload

Whether it’s manually buying on a banking app (line by line) or coordinating across multiple vendors, these fragmented systems create mountains of unnecessary admin. One missed meter means hours of backtracking, especially if there isn’t any central reporting.

3. Fee creep on banking apps

Many teams don’t realise how much they’re paying in transaction fees. Banking apps charge per top-up and, for large portfolios, those small charges stack up fast. That isn’t even mentioning their lack of invoicing options and reports.

4. Human error = service failure

With manual systems, there’s always a risk: Someone forgets to top up a meter, submits the wrong amount or skips one site. The result? Tenants complain, buildings go dark and your reputation takes a hit.

5. Invoicing gaps hurt finance

Without compliant, consolidated reporting, your finance team is left piecing together screenshots and ad-hoc recons. That’s not just messy; it can affect audits, tax submissions and internal reporting accuracy.

You can count these costs in your own operation today…

How to Calculate What You’re Losing to the Hidden Costs of Manual Recharges

Wondering if it’s really all that much? You can check for yourself by tallying the true cost:

Admin time: How many hours per month are spent buying electricity manually? Multiply by your team’s hourly rate and you’ll see just how expensive it really is.
Lost opportunity: Not only that. Ask what other higher-value tasks those employees could have been doing instead. Every minute they spend on simple, low-value tasks like buying and forwarding tokens represents an opportunity cost where you could have been making more money or delivering a better service with resources allocated to the right tasks.
Travel costs: Rising fuel costs, tolls, queues, etc. It all adds up when staff need to be mobile to go and buy tokens in person. Not to mention the costs everyone forgets: Vehicle wear and tear, and insurance. It’s all fun and games ‘till an expensive service comes around or you have a breakdown, on top of expensive monthly insurance installments.
Bank fees: Check last month’s statement. How much did your prepaid transactions actually cost? Baking apps are really only set up as a convenience element for households buying electricity for single homes. Once you try to do it at scale, you’ll see that the little bit they charge on every property adds up very fast into a potentially enormous monthly amount.
Vendor sprawl: And if you’re using different services for different municipalities, recon how many suppliers are involved, how much time is spent switching between workflows, sending payments and chasing confirmations. It all adds up to admin drain – unnecessary when you can get 1 vendor that covers >95% of the country instead.

When viewed together, these “invisible” costs often dwarf the price of a smart, integrated system. And you better believe that system exists…

How Prepaid24 Saves Property Teams Time, Money & Effort

Prepaid24 is a South African prepaid specialist with the most complete coverage of SA meters, vending for over 95% of SA municipalities. And we have a dedicated Prepaid24 Business Services team that comes in to assess your business’s current situation and prepaid needs, and through proper consideration and planning, offer you a tailor-fitted solution that properly suits your organisation.

For example

A large SA property management company was using multiple banking apps to recharge the meters of several Airbnb’s. But as their portfolio grew, the banking app route didn’t make sense anymore, as most banking apps have spend limits and the owner had to be constantly contacted to release payments. Bulk recharges were impossible.

This caused many administrative headaches and added the risk of reputational damage. Firstly, weekend outages became a potential crisis: When guests arrive at an Airbnb and the power is off, they are furious and report it on the app, causing owners to lose stars.

Secondly, trying to involve owners to help overcome spending limits caused a lot of friction between the property team and management.

The solution

The company came to Prepaid24, and we provided them with a bulk recharge option with zero spend limits and a SmartFund wallet, which allows them to top up units as needed without having to involve owners.

They also received professional reporting, with pro-forma and VAT invoices, clean and clearly labelled, so that everything is super easy to audit for financials. And they have a dedicated support team that’s able to help them troubleshoot issues with almost any meter at any municipality in the country.

Get Smarter Power Management

Still juggling multiple portals or vendors? You’re one missed top-up away from a serious operational headache. Prepaid24’s centralised B2B platform puts all your meters in one place, automates recharges and gives you instant control when it matters most.

Want to see how it works? Book a quick demo with Prepaid24 today.

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