METHOD OF SEALING. Meters that have been tested and found to be correct within the limits provided by law should be sealed in such a way that it will be impossible to open the portion of the meter containing the registering mechanisin and adjust this mechanism without defacing the seal. In my opinion this requirement can only be met by a sealing wax seal so placed as to partly cover the seam between the top plate and the body of the meter, since the registering mechanism can be gotten at only by removing this top plate. Seals for this purpose have been designed and made under the approval of Commissioner Maltbie and are now in use. Each seal bears a different number, and as a record is kept of the number of the seal used by each tester it is a simple matter to find out at any time by whom any meter was sealed. From what precedes it will be seen that it will be necessary to seal not only all new meters but also all meters which have been given repairs that necessitate the removal of the top plate and the adjusting of the registering mechanism, even though these meters had been tested and sealed previous to such repairs. In addition to the sealing wax seal the Massachusetts Commission of Gas and Electricity use a brass badge bearing a serial number which is attached to each meter when it is sealed for the first time. The object of this badge is to enable the record of the test of any meter to be easily found in the record of test books, something that would be difficult to do in the absence of such a badge. It seems probably, however, that the necessity for looking up such records would so seldom arise that the affixing of the serially numbered badges may be an unnecessary requirement. I would advise that these badges be not used until further investigation is made as to their practical value. In the meantime the meter test record book form has been drawn up to contain a column for these numbers, so that in case this system is adopted there will be a place in the records for entering the numbers. PROBABLE NUMBER OF METERS TO BE HANDLED PER YEAR, From information received from the gas companies doing business in the First District, I estimate that you will be called upon to test and seal each year about 66,000 new meters and 177,000 repaired meters, apart from the meters tested on applications from individual consumers. It is difficult to tell how many tests will have to be made on such applications since the number has varied very widely from year to year, but it is not probable that the maximum of about 6,000, reached in 1905, will be exceeded. Indeed, the number of meters tested on complaint in the thirteen months ending December 31, 1906, was only about 5,000, and it is probable that as soon as the gas consumers understand that the seal of the Commission on a meter stands for an actual and careful test of its accuracy the number of applications for the official testing of individual meters will fall much below even the smaller amount. As bearing on this probability the Massachusetts figures are of interest and show that in 1902, out of a total of 42,688 meters tested 996 were tested on consumers' complaints, while in 1906, although the total had increased to 61,034 the number of tests on complaint had dropped to 424. It is therefore probable that for the first year or two the number of meters to be tested and sealed will not be over 250,000 per year, or an average of 833 per day, counting 300 working days in the year. There will, however, be times during the months from September to March when meters will have to be handled at a rate of possibly 1,200 per day, and correspondingly there will be times during the rest of the year when the rate may fall as low as 500 per day. NUMBER OF METERS WHICH A MAN SHOULD TEST AND SEAL PER DAY OF EIGHT HOUrs. Working at a bench equipment with two provers, a good, active man should be able to test and seal nine three-light meters, or twelve five-light meters per hour, it being possible to do more of the five-light than of the three-light, because in both cases two cubic feet of air has to be passed through the meter, and in the five-light it is passed at a rate of thirty cubic feet, while in the three-light it is passed at a rate of only eighteen cubic feet per hour. These figures are based upon giving each meter only one test, but when, on repaired meters especially. the first test comes out close to the limit of error allowed, a second test should be made to make it certain that the meter is inside of these limits, and on account of these second tests the number that can be counted upon per hour will not run over seven three-lights or ten five-lights. As these two sizes will make up over two-thirds of the meters tested, it can be taken that the average number of meters tested and sealed per day will be about seventy-five. On this basis it will be necessary to employ an average of from ten to eleven testers, and this number would have to be increased to sixteen at the time of greatest activity in the selling and repairing of meters. This is the number of men that will be required for testing only, and in addition it will be necessary to provide for visiting the premises of the consumers making complaints for the purpose of obtaining the descriptions of the meters and tagging them for removal. The number of meters that can be located and tagged per man per day will depend so greatly upon the extent to which the individual locations are scattered over the territory that it is practically impossible to make any estimate of the number of men required for this work in advance of actual experience. If the applications for tests were to continue to come in at the rate which prevailed during 1906, of about 384 per month, or fifteen per working day, it would seem as if at least two men would be required for this work. The men assigned to this part of the work should be of a higher grade of intelligence and education than it is necessary to have in men who are to do nothing but test meters. PLACE OF TESTING. I would advise that all new meters purchased by gas companies in the district from meter companies whose factories are also located in the district be tested at these factories. It will be more economical to do this than to wait until the Ineters reach the companies and test them at their shops, because in the case of the small companies located on the outskirts of the district the meters will be purchased in comparatively small lots, and the time occupied by a tester in going to and coming from the companies' shops will be a very large proportion of the total time occupied in actually testing the meters. On the other hand, the meter factories are located in the centre of the district and the testers can be expected to reach these factories in their own time, and in addition will be able to test the meters in larger batches and so be able to average more for a given length of working time than if they are tested at the companies' shops. There should be no difficulty in identifying the meters which are to be used in the district, and therefore no danger of testing and sealing meters which are not going to be used in the territory covered by you. As far as I am able to learn the only meter factories in the district are as follows: METER FACTORIES IN DISTRICT AND PROBABLE REQUIREMENTS AT EACH FACTORY. I have not found that the last named factory is selling aufy meters in the district. The largest factory is that of the American Meter Company, and its manager tells me that at the busy time of the year they will sell to companies in the district at the rate of 8,000 meters per month, although it is not probable that they will sell altogether more than from 50,000 to 55.000 new meters per year to companies in the district, or an average of about 170 to 185 per day. The manager of the New York improved Meter Company was not very definite as to the number of meters that they put out in the district but put his lowest sales as being about 5,000 per year. As the company's estimates show only about 66,000 new meters purchased per year, it is not probable that this factory will run over 10,000 to 15,000 meters per year, or an average of between thirty to fifty per day. On the basis of the figures given above it will, therefore, probably be necessary to keep two testers at the factory of the American Meter Company all the time and increase this number up to four at the time of greatest activity, while it will not be necessary to have a man stationed at the New York Improved Meter Company's factory all the time, although at times it may be necessary to place two men there. TESTING OF REPAIRED METERS. The meters which have been repaired to such an extent as to require retesting and resealing can be best tested at the shops of those companies who do their own repairing, or who have repairing done outside of the district, and at the factories when the companies who do not do their own repairing have it done by the factories in the district. The companies who do their own repairing are as follows: Consolidated Gas Company, which has one large shop at the corner of First avenue and Twenty-first street, where repairs are made not only to its own meters but also to those of the New York Mutual Gas Light Company. According to the information furnished by the superintendent of shops of the Consolidated Gas Company there are repaired at this shop, to an extent requiring retesting and resealing, meters to the number of 100,000 per year, or an average of about 330 per day. Standard Gas Light Company, the meter shop of which is on Ninety-first street east of First avenue. The number of meters repaired at this shop and which it would be necessary to retest and reseal, was stated to be about 12,500 per year, or an average of about 41 per day. New Amsterdam Gas Company, the shop of which is on Forty-second street east of First avenue. At this shop it was stated that the number of meters repaired and which would require retesting and resealing was about 13,000 per year, or an average of about 44 per day. . Central Union Gas Company, the shop of which is at the corner of Alexander avenue and One Hundred and Forty-second street, borough of The Bronx. This company repairs not only its own meters but also those of the Northern Union Gas Company, and of the Westchester Lighting Company, only part of the territory supplied by the latter company being in the First district. The company informed me that the number of meters belonging in the First District which were repaired at this shop and would require retesting and resealing would be about 13,000 per year, or an average of about 44 per day. The Brooklyn Union Gas Company, which has two meter repair shops, one being on Atlantic avenue and the other at the corner of Bedford avenue and South Second street, both in Brooklyn. The total number of meters repaired by the company during a year was stated to be about 35,000, or about 117 per day, of which two-thirds are handled at the Atlantic avenue shop and the remaining one-third at the Bedford avenue shop. The Brooklyn Union Company also repairs the meters belonging to its subsidiary companies, viz., the Flatbush Gas Company, the Jamaica Gas Light Company, the Newtown Gas Light Company and the Richmond Hill and Queens Gas Company, and the meters of these companies are included in the total given above. Kings County Lighting Company, which has its meter repair shop at its works at Fifty-fifth street and First avenue, Brooklyn, and which repairs, in such a way as to require retesting and resealing, 600 meters per year, or an average of only 2 per day. The Brooklyn Borough Gas Company, which has a repair shop at its works on Sheepshead Bay, Coney Island, and which repairs, in such a way as to require retesting and resealing, about 500 meters per year, or less than 2 per day. Queens Borough Gas and Electric Company at Far Rockaway, which repairs at its own shop an average of 4 meters a day, and has, in addition to this, about 100 meters per year repaired at the meter factories. The New York and Richmond Gas Company, which has its office at Stapleton, and its works at Clifton, Staten Island, and which repairs at its own works about 700 meters and has repaired at the meter factories within the District about 600 meters per year. The companies which at present do not repair their own meters, but have them repaired at the meter factories within the First District, are — The Bronx Gas and Electric Company, Westchester, and the New York and Queens Gas Company, at Flushing, From the figures given for the companies which repair their own meters it will be seen that it will be necessary to keep an average of between four and five men at the shop of the Consolidated Gas Company, and that almost the full time of two men will be required by the Brooklyn Union Company, while the Standard, New Amsterdam and Central Union companies will, between them, come close to requiring the services of two more. The number of meters repaired per day by the other companies are so small that their requirements during the course of a year will not amount altogether to more than about forty days for one man. TESTING OF COMPLAINT METERS. The complaint meters, that is, those which are tested because of doubt in the mind of the consumers in regard to their accuracy, will, in every case, have to be tested at the shop of the company to which the meter belongs. The present custom with the Brooklyn Union Company is to have all these complaint meters tested at the office of the branch in the territory to which the consumer belongs, and it is possible that this method may prove as convenient as that of having all the complaint meters sent to one or the other of the two meter repair shops, but this is a question which will have to be decided as a matter of experience. It may also be found, after further experience, that it will be more convenient both for the companies and the Commission, to have the complaint meters from the small companies operating in the more distant parts of the district sent to a central testing place, such as that at the factory of the American Meter Company, or that at the shop of the Consolidated Gas Company. In case this method of handling complaint meters for the small companies is adopted the consumer should be made to pay the cost of sending the meter to this central testing place and of returning it to the shop of the company in addition to the regular fee charged for the State inspection. This is done in Massachusetts, where practically all of the complaint meters from different parts of the State are sent to Boston to be tested. METHOD OF HANDLING APPLICATIONS FROM CONSUMERS FOR METER TESTS. I would advise that applications for the testing of meters by consumers be handled as follows: When the application is made in person the clerk shall fill out the application blank, form "A" (copy of all the forms mentioned is appended to this report), and have it signed. When the application is made by letter the application blank need not be filled out, the letter serving as the written application required by law. The application having been properly signed, or having been received by letter, the clerk shall take a card (form" B"), which cards shall be numbered serially with the application number and used in order of these numbers, and enter upon it the date, the name and address of the person making the application, and the name of the gas company supplying the premises and the amount of the fee, if the size of the meter is known, and if the fee is paid indicate it by entering the date in the proper space and give the proper receipt for it. When this data has been entered the clerk shall turn the card over to the Chief Inspector. The Chief Inspector will assign the application to one of his subordinates, entering the name of the person to whom this assignment is made in the proper place. After the assignment to the proper inspector has been entered, the clerk shall separate the two parts of form "B," file the duplicate in the proper place in order of the application number and turn the original over to the Chief Inspector. If the application is in writing the clerk shall also fill out and mail to the consumer form "L" as a notification that the application will be attended to. All the applications assigned to any one inspector shall be turned over to him at the end of each day. The inspector to whom an application is assigned shall take form "B" and proceed to the premises designated on this form. On arrival there he shall collect the fee. if it has not been paid, entering on form "B" the payment of this fee and giving the proper receipt for it, and shall locate the meter and enter upon form "B" its description. He shall then fill out form "C." detach the white original sheet from the tag and attach the tag to the meter, entering the date in the proper place on form "B" as an indication that the meter has been tagged. At the end of the day he shall send in to the office all the copies of form "B" and all the white sheets of form C" for the meters that he has attended to. When they reach the office the clerk shall send the white sheets of form "C" to the proper gas companies to constitute the removal orders for the meters, shall enter upon the cards, form "B," in the proper place, the date upon which these orders have been sent, and shall then send the cards to the proper testing stations as a notification that the meters described on them are to be received and tested. Upon receiving form "B" at the testing station the tester shall look out for the arrival of the meter described on this form, and, when it is received, shall enter in the proper place the date of its receipt. He shall then test the meter, after allowing it to remain in the station not less than five (5) hours in order that the temperatures may be equalized, within twenty-four hours after its receipt, unless the consumer desires to be present at the test and it cannot be arranged to secure his presence within this time limit. After the test has been made the tester shall enter upon form "B" the cubic feet passed by the meter and by the prover, and the percentage, fast or slow, shown by the test. He shall also fill out form "D" and paste it upon the meter. At the end of each day he shall send into the office all the copies of form "B" upon which he has recorded the results of tests during the day. When the card is returned from the testing station the record clerk shall send formal notice of the result of the test to the gas company, using for this purpose form" E," and shall also send formal notice of the result of the test to the consumer, using form "F" if the meter is correct or slow, and form "G" if the meter is fast. After filling out these notices he shall enter upon form "B" the date on which they are sent. If the meter is fast and the fee deposited for the test is returned to the consumer the record clerk shall enter upon form "B" the date on which this fee was returned. He shall also enter upon form "B" the date upon which the fee for a fast meter is paid by the gas company. In the case of a meter which is correct, or slow, the two last entries do not have to be made. When form "B" has been entirely filled out it shall be filed in the proper place alphabetically by the name of the consumer, and the duplicate which has been held up to this time as a check upon the completion of the work shall be destroyed, or, if the original shall have become too soiled, the information on the original may be transferred to the duplicate and the latter filed, while the original is destroyed. METHOD OF HANDLING APPLICATIONS FROM GAS COMPANIES FOR METER TESTS. In many cases an agreement to have a meter tested officially is made between the gas company and the consumer affected, and the securing of the test is left to the gas company. In such cases the application for the test should be made upon form J. and a description of the meter given upon this application. There is no reason why the meters covered by these applications should be tagged by a State Inspector, since, if there is any suspicion that the proper meter is not produced for test, this suspicion can be easily proved or disproved by an examination of the company's records, which will always contain a description of the meter set on the premises of each consumer. In fact, the Gas and Electric Commission of Massachusetts does not tag any of the meters which it tests on complaint, not even those located in Boston, which form by far the largest number of complaint meters tested by them, but depend entirely upon the ability to check the identity of the meter from the records of the company in case any suspicion arises. A card, form "B," should, however, be filled out and all the entries except those in regard to payment of fee, assignment to inspector, and date of tagging, made as in the case of an application by a consumer before the duplicate is sent to the testing place. In addition, the fact that the application has been made by the company should be noted on the back of the card, as this fact will govern the notices to be sent out after the test. The original shall be kept in the office as a check upon the making of the test, as in the case of an application made by a consumer. After the test has been made notices shall be sent to the consumer and to the gas company, but these notices, from the nature of the case, will differ slightly from those sent when the test has been made upon application of the consumer, and will be as per forms "M" and "N." The gas companies shall be billed monthly for the fees for all the meters tested upon their applications, and also for those tested upon consumers' applications which have proved to be fast and the fee for which has, therefore, been returned to the consumer. RECORD OF ALL METER TESTS. Each meter tested shall be provided with a Gas Meter Test Record Book, ruled and printed according to the form which has already been handed in. In this book he shall enter in the proper columns the description of each meter tested and the record of the test, including the state of the index, the number of cubic feet of gas passed by the meter and by the prover, the percentage of error of the meter and whether fast or slow, the temperature of the water in the prover and the air in the testing room, and the pressure at which the test is made. He shall also enter any remarks that are called for by the test. These entries in the Test Record Book shall be made for complaint meters in addition to the similar entries on form "B." Each page of this book shall be signed by the meter tester making the tests recorded on it. These books have been made up so that all of these entries will be made both on an original and on a duplicate sheet, and the duplicates are to be detached from the book and sent to the office of the Bureau of Gas and Electricity daily. At this office they will be filed in any suitable form of binder, the tests made by each man being kept all together. RECORD OF WORK DONE BY EACH GAS METER TESTER. From the gas meter test record sheets the number of meters of each size tested by each Meter Tester shall be made up for each day and entered upon a card 5 x 8 inches, which shall be headed: Month of RECORD OF WORK DONE BY GAS METER TESTERS. 19 and ruled so as to have a separate vertical column for the date and for each of the standard sizes of gas meters up to 300 lights. This card will have spaces for the entry of the work done on twenty-seven different days each month with a space at the bottom for the total for the month. A properly ruled form for this card is handed in with this report. By means of these cards a complete record of the amount of work done by each Meter Tester will be available and it will be very easy to see from them just which of the men, if any, are not doing a full day's work. SUMMARY OF GAS METER TESTS. For the purpose of keeping a summary of the meter tests so as to make it possible to know just how much work has been done at the end of each month, there should be made up books so ruled as to show a summary of all the gas meter tests made on each day. There will be two of these books, one of which will contain on each double page the record for a month of all the new meters and all the repaired meters fested during that month, these meters being divided by sizes into two classes, "O. K.," and Needing Adjusting." the latter being the meters that have been found to be in error to a greater extent than the limits allowed by law and which have therefore been turned back to either the maker or the gas company for adjustment and retest. A form of ruling for this book is handed in with this report. The second book will be so ruled as to show on each double page the summary of the complaint meters tested in any one month, the meters being separated by sizes and there being given under each size the number found to be correct, fast and slow, and the total percentage fast and slow. There are also columns giving the total number O K., fast and slow and the grand total percentage fast and slow, and in addition columns in which are to be entered the number and sizes of the meters which do not register or do not pass gas, the number fast or slow between definite percentage limits and the maximum percentage of error fast and slow shown in any test during the month, with the size of the meter showing these errors. These summary books, which will be kept in the office of the Bureau of Gas and Electricity, the proper figures being prepared from the reports sent in by the different Meter Testers, and entered daily, will provide at any time all the information in regard to the results of the meter testing that experience shows it is advisable to have. In my opinion the various forms and books which have been described above are all that will be required for the handling of complaint gas meter tests and the recording of the tests of such meters as well as those made of new and repaired meters. In addition to the "Instructions for Meter Testers" and the copies of the various forms and books which have been mentioned above there are also appended to this report Instructions for the Handling of Applications for Tests by Consumers." divided into instructions as to the work done by each person through whose hands the application, or the meter covered by it, has to pass. Respectfully submitted, ALFRED E. FORSTALL. "Breakdown Service." *[Electric companies may not refuse to provide breakdown service to competitors.] PRELIMINARY REPORT OF COMMISSIONER MALTBIE. Approved by the Commission. To the Public Service Commission for the First District: April 1, 1908. SIRS Having completed for the moment the consideration of "breakdown service in the investigation of the electric light companies and having obtained from the New York Edison Company concessions of great benefit and. financial value to consumers, I submit the following preliminary report pending the completion of the entire investigation. TERM DEFINED. The term "breakdown service has such a technical meaning that a few words of explanation are necessary. Narrowly defined, it is the service which an electricity supply company renders when it provides a "connection" between its system and the installation of a consumer having his own electric plant, and agrees to stand ready to supply such consumer with current whenever his plant actually breaks down in whole or in part. As currently used, however, the term includes two other kinds of service: first, the service rendered by the supply company to the owners of private plants (both readiness-to-serve and current) during nights, See footnote, page 9. |