Hmo gas and electric meter payments..help!!!

[pebbles71]

Hi, Im hoping someone can help us with our situation.

Myself and partner have two rooms in a HMO 4 bedroomed house. There are two other single tenants who each have two rooms. We share the bathroom, downstairs toilet and kitchen. One of the tenants recently was arrested and we havent seen him since so there is just mself and partner and one other tenant trying to afford the gas and electric for a huge house. (There is one pre-paid gas and electric meter for the whole house which we all put monies on)

In our tenacy agreements it states that we have to put '£10 towards the cost of gas and electric weekly.' However even before the other tenant went, we were all struggling to afford the cost of the gas and electric and even more so now. On average we are putting on approx £70 mth each.

My question is ...is it down to us tenants to pay more than is in the tenancy agreements? We have asked the landlords agent to help towards the cost but he refuses.

We are all over 40 and most of us respectable people who unfortuneatly have ended up in a HMO property due to job redundancies etc and just simply cant afford to pay this amount of money to heat/light a house where we only realy use 2 rooms!

 

Please Please advise us as to who should be paying the extra...us or the agent?

Thanking you in advance

Pebbles and co x

[Cadbury1879]

Hi

I'm no expert, but will give you a opinion.

If the tenancy agreement, states a figure I feel that the landlord should be contributing.

I would try to arrange a meeting with the Landlord or Agent and resolve this matter. I would also put everything in writing and keep copies. Legally the Tenancy agreement is the document that should cover disputes.

Might be worth consulting CAB etc for there opinion.

Good luck

Cad

[mariner51]

Pre-payment meters suggest Ts, not LL, are resp for cost of energy consumed. The suggestion of each T paying £10/wk is just an amicable way of saying the energy costs are divided equally between Ts.

It is possible that the meter(s) are set to recover debt of previous Ts. Worth getting energy co out to check the meter with ASTs to hand to show when current Ts started. Ts can change supplier to get a better deal, so shop around.

[pebbles71]

Hi again,

Thanks for your replies. Have had meetings with agent who is non compliant with any issues we have all had here...he simply says as long as he gets his rent he dont care everything else is done to us.

 

BUT...... we have been offered a ground floor one bed flat with a garden today from the council...as for at least myself and partner, the troubles will be over!!!

 

Thanks again

Pebbles x

[Cadbury1879]

Excellent, good luck

Cad