[South Africa] Load Shedding & PrePaid Electricity

[Fabian]

Load Shedding
In South Africa, there's unfortunately a bit of a snag when it comes to electricity – at times, the demand exceeds what the country can actually generate.

This leads to what they call "Load Shedding." During Load Shedding, certain areas of the grid are switched off in phases to provide electricity to other areas during that period.

The only exception is the mobile network, which stays operational despite the Load Shedding.

Many restaurants, shops, and residential buildings, however, have backup power supplies, so the outage often goes unnoticed.

Accommodations, on the other hand, are rarely equipped with their own backup power. Nevertheless, we had a small power bank in many apartments, ensuring the internet router stayed powered up.

Load Shedding it just a part of daily life, but an inconvenient one.

For keeping track of Load Shedding schedules, I recommend using one of the following apps: City of CAPE Town - iOS APP
City of CAPE Town - Android APP




Prepaid Electricity
It's not uncommon for Airbnb or holiday rentals apartments in South Africa to have electricity costs separate from the rental price. It's not a scam and a common practice. Sometimes Electricity needs to be prepaid at the meter. You can purchase electricity for example, through the app mentioned below or at local stores like PickAndPay.