Utilities Business Information Model

Electric, gas, and water utilities run on a specific set of entities — premises, meters, accounts, and the physical network connecting them — that a generic data model usually collapses into a simple customer record. This Business Information Model keeps them properly separated: foundational, transactional, and informational entities, delivered as an editable Word document.

The Premise-Meter-Account Problem

Utility data breaks the standard customer-product-order template almost immediately, starting with the premise. A single premise can have several meters — electric, gas, submeters — a single account can span several premises, and a single customer can hold several accounts, so the real hierarchy looks more like a network than the flat customer-to-order chain most generic models assume. Physical network assets — transformers, feeders, substations, pipeline segments — need parent-child relationships that mirror actual grid topology, because that's the only way to answer which customers sit behind a failed asset during an outage. Smart meters add a high-frequency interval-read entity that's structurally different from a monthly bill, and rate schedules are regulatory artifacts tied to tariff filings and rate cases rather than simple product prices. Miss any of these and the model can't actually support outage management or regulatory reporting.

What You Get

• Foundational entities: Premise, Meter, Account, Network Asset (grid/pipeline topology), Rate Schedule/Tariff
• Transactional entities: Meter Read/Interval Data, Service Order (connect/disconnect), Outage Event, Billing/Invoice
• Informational entities: Consumption Analytics, Outage Duration/Frequency, Load Forecasts, Regulatory Reporting Metrics
• Entity relationship diagram reflecting the premise-meter-account hierarchy and asset topology
• Delivered as a fully editable Word document

Common Uses

• As a starting point for a customer information system (CIS) or meter data management (MDM) data model
• To scope master data management for premise, meter, and asset domains
• To plan integrations between billing, outage management, and grid or network systems
• As a shared reference across IT, operations, and regulatory teams during system modernization

Designed For

Data architects, business architects, and IT leaders at electric, gas, and water utilities — and the vendors and consultancies serving them — who need a credible starting point for CIS/MDM data architecture or grid modernization work.