Silly me. The electric meter on this house was making a faint buzzing sound when I moved in, so I called the power company and had it replaced. Probably should have kept it for lower rates, lol.
On most single family dwellings I've seen here, the electric meter is kept exposed on the side of the home, and the gas meter is often behind a little unlocked cabinet size door on the side of the home (usually near the ground, because they're heavy). My gas meter is under the house, accessible through a small door.
The power company periodically sends out messages with the bills explaining that if, for some reason, such as locked gates/doors, vicious dogs, etc., its meter readers can't get to the meter, then the power company will, by law, average the use for the past year and send a monthly bill based on that, and of course arrange for a safe meter reading to make adjustments on an annual basis.
Not sure how large apartment houses in The City arrange for meter readings. At my mom's old apartment building, the meters for each apartment were all in an enclosed ground level hallway behind a locked door to the street. I assumed the power company must have had a key, or some way (like a lockbox, good idea) to get into it. As I recall, she never had a key to that door, either, even though it functioned as a back door to the building. It is possible to make a lock that can have two keys - one which opens all locks like it, and another specific to that lock. The power company would key all the locks to such doors with the dual-key type lock, and keep the master key, while each apartment building owner would have a key that only opened their building's lock. This is the way many office buildings operate. And, I assume, older hotel rooms with mechanical and not electronic locks, so that housekeeping can get in to clean.
