I have heard that people’s electricity bills went up after the new meters were installed. Is this true?

In some instances, yes. This is because the old, mechanical meter was running slower than it should and therefore was giving artificially low usage readings. The new meters use electronics to measure usage and this resulted in a small number of customers having higher bills despite no change in their behavior, a direct result of more accurate metering.

With no moving parts to wear down, the new meters will provide more accurate readings for a longer period of time. With the new AMI meters, all co-op members are more fairly billed for the actual amount of electricity used than may have happened during the era when electro-mechanical meters were read manually.