A month goes by and the reading is not submitted. The bill arrives anyway, with an amount on it. Where does that amount come from, if nobody knows what you used?
This article is about Ukraine — the rules cited are the Ukrainian retail electricity market rules. Other countries handle a missed reading differently.
The meter keeps counting; the bill is worked out separately
These are two different things, and confusing them causes half the misunderstandings. The meter does not stop. It goes on counting kilowatt-hours whether you reported anything or not. What you used is not written off and not forgiven — it is simply not counted yet.
The bill, however, has to be issued. So the volume is estimated.
Where the number comes from
The basis is your average daily consumption. Ukraine's retail market rules define it as the average volume used in one day, calculated on the basis of actual consumption over a given period. So it is not a norm and not a building average — it is your own history.
The arithmetic follows: the last known actual reading, plus that average day multiplied by the number of days. The Commercial Metering Code sets out exactly this procedure for when no actual reading exists for the date required.
The consequence is not obvious but it matters: an estimated month looks like your previous ones. Go away for a month and leave the flat empty, and you will still be billed as for an ordinary month — the system does not know you were gone. It cuts the other way too: after a cold month with a heater running, your average day rises, and an empty month is then estimated at more than it really was.
Where the difference goes
Nowhere. It waits.
When you finally submit an actual reading, the volume for the whole missed stretch becomes known, and the difference between the estimate and the truth has to be settled. That is when the notorious «sudden large bill» arrives, and when people start searching for what went wrong. Nothing went wrong: you are being charged for what you had already used, late.
How that correction itself works we covered separately, in the article on recalculations from the grid operator: the difference does not rewrite last month's bill, it arrives as a separate line in the next one.
By what date to submit — not a question this article can answer
There is no single date for everyone, and that is not a simplification. The rules say plainly that the form, the procedure and the deadlines for settlement are set in the contract and the commercial offer of your own supplier. The window differs between suppliers and can change without your involvement. So the only reliable source is your own contract or account page, not an article quoting a date.
What to do about it
The conclusion is the same as with recalculations: keep your own record of readings. You need it at exactly the moment the bill for the missed months arrives — to see which figure they counted from, how much of it is your real consumption, and whether the difference adds up. Without your own record there is nothing to check against.
How this looks in Платіжка
The app keeps your history of readings and amounts month by month: what you entered and what was calculated from it. A missed month is visible at once — there is no data of yours against it, and that is where the difference will land later. And when the estimated bill does arrive, you can enter it as it stands: for amounts that follow no formula there is a manual-amount tariff.