3 Steps to accurate Load-shedding Schedules in East London
Load shedding has reared it’s ugly head again. Here is a guide on understanding the new load shedding schedules?
ShowMe East London has created an easy 3-step guide on how to find the correct schedule for your area:
Step 1. How to establish if you are a BCM or Eskom Direct User.
Once you have established WHERE you get your electricity from, use our easy instructions below to guide you on HOW you can get accurate daily schedules.
Step 2. Process to follow if you fall under Buffalo City Municipality.
Step 3. Process to follow if you fall under Eskom Direct.
STEP 1: How to establish if you are a BCM or Eskom Direct User
Electricity in Buffalo City and the surrounding areas is supplied by two different suppliers:
BCM (Buffalo City Municipality) Eskom (Direct)
Each of the above suppliers has their own Load-shedding Schedule therefore it is important for you to establish which electricity supplier provides electricity to you in your area.
This is easy enough to establish by looking at your electricity bill:
- If it comes from Buffalo City Municipality, you will fall under the BCM Load-shedding Schedule.
- If your electricity bill comes directly from Eskom, you will fall under the Eskom Schedule.
- If you do not get an electricity bill and purchase your electricity for an electricity meter, you will have to find out by process of elimination. Review both the BCM & Eskom Schedules until you find one that coincides with your outages. We recommend that you start by looking on the BCM Load-shedding Schedules as this seems to cover most of central East London.
STEP 2: Buffalo City Eskom Schedules
The New Load Shedding Schedule works on a ROLLING BLOCK TIMETABLE.
Here are the steps to follow to identify your load shedding schedule:
1. | Identify which BLOCK you fall under (there are now 19 Blocks). |
Click HERE to find out what block you fall under. Be patient, you only need to do this once! 😉 | |
2. | Identify what load shedding STAGE is currently in process. |
Visit the ShowMe East London LOAD SHEDDING PAGE and select the “Stages 1 – 8 load-shedding schedules for East London (BCM)” link. | |
Once you know what load shedding STAGE is in effect AND what your BLOCK is, click on the applicable stage in the above mentioned schedule and the load-shedding blocks will be listed by TIME and DAY OF THE MONTH. |
STEP 3: If you fall under Eskom – choosing the right ‘Area’
If you have established that you fall under the Eskom Load-shedding Schedule, click on the ESKOM link on the ShowMe East London daily schedules.
You will then have a choice of 2 ‘geographical’ areas, with suburbs listed beneath:
Complete the relevant information for your area in the fields (as shown above) and if your area is experiencing load-shedding, a report such as this will show. If nothing comes up, it could be that the network is slow or the system is overloaded and you need to give it a few minutes before trying again.
Eskom unlike BCM, does not provide us with a ‘daily summary’ of every Eskom Area so if you get your electricity from Eskom, the only way to establish your load-shedding schedule, is via this link.
ShowMe East London’s ‘Tips’
Once you have established the 3 points above i.e. who supplies you with electricity, where to find the schedules and what Area you fall under (if on the Eskom Schedule), you will find that the load-shedding schedules are pretty accurate and can be relied on for the most part.
The biggest ‘moving target’ however is when Eskom changes from Stage 1 to Stage 2 or from Stage 2 to stage 3 etc. This is a moving target (yes, even for Eskom) are determined by how much electricity is being drawn from the grid. When the demand is too high, Eskom will have to implement a higher stage of load-shedding to reduce the pressure on the grid.
Please Note:
As each of these STAGES (1 – 8) have completely different schedules, it often happens that just after implementing Stage 1 Load-Shedding, the demand increases drastically and Eskom moves to Stage 2 Load-shedding (with very little notice). Your schedule may now appear to be wrong, where in fact it is correct, you are just not aware the the Load-shedding STAGE has been upgraded.
The only way to be on top of the situation is to continually keep checking for regular updates.