Computer software for use in the energy and utility fields for communications with customers, for monitoring and transmitting usage data, for monitoring and controlling energy appliances, for providing information to consumers and system operators, for tracking, configuring and managing electric meter devices, for creating and maintaining security profiles, for performing automated meter readings with pre-defined intervals, for performing on-demand meter reads, for providing information about service connections and disconnections, for providing prepayment technical support, for customer messaging, for providing time-of-use billing and for providing access to demand-side management applications such as demand response, to be run on devices that can connect to a variety of communications methods including wireless Internet, cellular, SMS, and others; Computer software for use in the energy and utility fields for networking systems primarily comprised of computer networking hardware for communications with customers, for monitoring and transmitting usage data, for monitoring and controlling energy appliances, for providing information to consumers and system operators, for tracking, configuring and managing electric meter devices, for creating and maintaining security profiles, for performing automated meter readings with pre-defined intervals, for performing on-demand meter reads, for providing information about service connections and disconnections, for providing prepayment technical support, customer messaging, for providing time-of-use billing, and for providing access to demand-side management applications such as demand response