Where's My Power? Here's How to Query Your Prepaid Electricity Slip

Shouting at your bank, who’s actually responsible, and how to read your slip correctly – this is how to query your prepaid electricity slip if you’re not happy with the units you got.

Think the bank or shop cheated you out of units?

It’s a scene most South Africans know too well. You buy R200 or R500’s worth of prepaid electricity, load the token, but the units on your meter don’t look right. It’s too little!

Frustrated, you rush back to the store, wave the slip at the cashier and demand answers. Or you try to get someone from the bank on the phone, to no avail. The truth is: The cashier and your bank manager have no control over your electricity. They can’t change your tariffs, they can’t fix your meter, and they certainly can’t give you extra units.

If you really want to resolve the issue, you need to know how to query prepaid electricity slips properly. That means understanding who is actually responsible for what, gathering the right information and following the right steps.

Once you do all of this, you’ll save yourself time, energy and frustration – and you’ll get the answers you need. Here’s how…

Who Is Actually Responsible For Your Prepaid Electricity

Before you learn how to query a prepaid electricity slip, it helps to know how the system is set up. Responsibility is split across different parties: Your municipality (or Eskom) sets the prices (approved by Nersa), applies block/step tariffs and maintains the meters. If you’re a direct Eskom customer, Eskom handles this role. If you buy through your local municipality, they’re the authority.

The vending agent is the shop, bank or online service where you purchased your token. Their role is to process your payment and request the electricity token from your municipality or Eskom, who are the actual issuers of all tokens.

This division of accountability explains a lot of common frustrations. If your token loads but the units are lower than expected, it’s most likely a tariff issue set by your municipality, not the shop.

If your token doesn’t load at all, it’s a vending or technical error. And if your meter cuts out, it’s usually a hardware fault, not a problem with your purchase.

And, when something goes wrong, it helps to ask about it in the right way…

How to Query Prepaid Electricity Step by Step

Now let’s get practical. If you want results, here’s exactly how to query a prepaid electricity purchase most effectively:

1. Keep Your Slip as Proof of Purchase

Always hold onto your slip or digital receipt. This contains your transaction reference, meter number and the exact amount you paid. Without it, it’s almost impossible to log a proper query.

2. Compare Your Units with Tariffs

Before assuming there’s a fault, compare the number of units you received with your municipality’s published block tariff schedule. Remember that buying more doesn’t always mean cheaper electricity – block tariffs can actually make large purchases way more expensive per unit.

See our post on how to understand your prepaid slip. (This usually clears up most queries before they even take place.)

3. Contact the Correct Person/Party

If your token doesn’t load at all when you try to enter it into your meter, you can start by checking that the meter number on the token slip actually matches your meter number as shown on your meter itself. If it does and the token still isn’t accepted (after trying 2 or 3 times to account for possible typing errors on your part - tokens are long), the issue lies with your municipality or Eskom, since they are the ones who issue the tokens and control meter authorisation.

If you got fewer units than you expected, that’s something to take up with your municipality or Eskom tariffs, not the cashier. Remember, those who sell tokens are not the ones who generate the tokens. Their job is just to accept payment and forward tokens that they get from the municipality or Eskom.

And, if your meter is faulty (displaying an error code or not working), contact your municipality or Eskom’s technical support line directly. They are in charge of maintaining meters and are the only ones who are authorised to work on them.

4. Have All The Details Ready

When logging the query, include your meter number, proof of purchase and the units you received. The more detail you give upfront, the faster your issue can be resolved.

Where Prepaid24 Is Different: We Query Your Power For You

Here’s the reality: Most vendors and cashiers simply can’t help you beyond issuing a receipt. Why? Because selling electricity is not their core business - it’s just a small add-on to their main business. So it does not make sense for them to undergo weeks of training and build up expertise in this field.

Municipal call centres are also often overwhelmed and Eskom’s lines are notorious for long waits.

That’s why so many South Africans switch to Prepaid24 for their prepaid electricity.

With Prepaid24, you get expert prepaid support, every single day of the week, across multiple channels: live chat, WhatsApp, email and phone. Our consultants don’t just point fingers. They trace your transaction, explain your slip line by line and even escalate issues to the right authority on your behalf, if needed.

Instead of being bounced between retailers and municipalities, you get clear answers from one trusted support team. True, sometimes you will still need to contact your municipality directly. But if ANYTHING can be done to avoid that, we will.

Simply put: Prepaid24 makes it easier to query prepaid electricity purchases – and to get back the peace of mind you deserve.

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