The Hindu : Andhra Pradesh / Hyderabad News : CPDCL temporarily suspends SMS alert service

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Monday, Dec 27, 2010
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Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh - Hyderabad

CPDCL temporarily suspends SMS alert service

Swathi.V

Through an SMS, customers were updated about bill due dates, acknowledgement of payments
We hope to re-launch the service soon in all the five circles, says an official

HYDERABAD: Just over a year into its implementation, the SMS alert service launched by the Central Discom has hit a roadblock and been temporarily suspended.

The service was launched with an aim to notify the consumers about possible power outages and bill due dates through automatic generation of text messages on their respective mobile phones.

A mammoth exercise was carried out to collect the consumers' mobile contacts through various approaches. An interface was developed to process the text messages and slot them by feeders and transformers.

An SMS Gateway Provider was chosen to route the text through various mobile phone service providers to the end consumer.

Initially experimented with as a pilot project in Indira Park Division, it was later extended to the whole of Central Circle, and later in all the three circles of the Metro Zone.

Proposals were on the cards to centralise the service at SCADA so as to extend it to the two circles of Ranga Reddy Zone which fall into the purview of the GHMC.

Outages

Truth be spoken, the project was only partly implemented even in the city. Many consumers here began to receive SMS alerts about bill due dates and acknowledgement of payments, but the outages were never informed.

Of late, consumers stopped getting even the alerts about due dates. CPDCL authorities blame it on the tendering process whereby the lowest bidder is given the contract to ensure economical operation of the system.

The service provider nominated for implementation of the pilot project could not win the contract in the final bidding, and hence it was awarded to a new person.

“As per rule book, we should give the contract to the lowest bidder which we did. But the project has since been stopped as the new service provider needed time to automate his systems according to the needs. We hope to re-launch the service soon in all the five circles,” a senior official informed.

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