At a press briefing at the JPS's Knutsford Boulevard headquarters in New Kingston, the energy company said it had recovered $242 billion from January to September after auditing large and small businesses customers.

The company also said that it has recovered $180 million in revenue after doing the same for residential accounts.

JPS, which has over 580,000 customers on its books, says that it loses more than $4 billion in revenue yearly from electricity theft, most of which comes from the business sector.

Although the theft of electricity in Jamaica includes inner-city communities conjuring up webs of wires feeding on JPS lines in a practice known as 'bridging', officials at JPS pointed out that electricity theft occurred across all levels of society.

Major tactics

One of the major tactics which JPS has used is the installation of Smart Grid: Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI) for both business and residential areas.

The company, which has forecasted that 4,500 businesses will have AMI meters by year-end, has already provided 2,600 business customers with these. Since 2008, this investment has cost JPS $270 million.

The company says it has seen an upswing in electricity consumption by two million kWh monthly after the installation of 2000 AMI commercial and industrial meters.

The company has also pumped $450 million into installing the AMI in residential households in the communities of Old Harbour Bay, Clifton in St Catherine and Seaview Gardens in Kingston.

This technology will be expanded across the island, but not in all communities, according to JPS officials.

Garth McKenzie, director of regional operations at the company has trumpeted the advantages of the AMI, saying it has benefits for the customers as well as JPS.

Damian Obliglio, CEO of JPS, said that the cost of the installation of the AMI technology would not be passed on to the consumer.

The company has also doubled its efforts in the first 10 months by removing 106,100 illegal wires, compared to the figure of 42,425 for the entire period last year.

JPS will also dedicate a staff complement of 250 to battle electricity theft, while spending $8 billion over five years.