Monday, August 26, 2002		Feature

THE Himachal Pradesh State Electricity Board (HPSEB) launched spot-billing system through handheld computers for spot billing and cash collection through laser scanned machines. With this, Himachal becomes the first state in region to introduce the system of modern management tools with the latest state-of-the-art technology. Introduced as a replicable pilot project to be extended to other towns in the state in due course of time, the above system presently covers Shimla city consumers only. Importantly, the Web-enabling of the consumer database for browsing the bills on the Internet for the residents of Shimla town is another first in the world. Also, the HPSEB Website, www.hpseb.com, has the unique facility of bill-calculation where a consumer can calculate at any point of time or to check the bill received.

The board has also introduced a system of looking at the bill or anybody’s consumer bill on the Internet by enabling the consumer database on the Web. The consumer can pay as per the bill appearing on the Net without waiting for the formal bill. The facility of payment through Internet banking is also proposed.

Handheld computer (HHC) for spot billing is a versatile and rugged device with in-built 24 col. printer and useful machine for field data capture. The HPSEB is generating bills with bar codes that are read by the laser scanner installed with the cash collection machines automatically.

The development of software for LT and HT billing has been carried out with the assistance of the Regional Computer Centre, Chandigarh.