[ADVICE] Can they make us pay this???

We've been renting this house for 2 years. Yesterday we received a water bill. The agent wants us to fwd payment to them, as the bill has been paid in full. I have no proof of this. The billing period was Nov 10 to June 11.

We've never been asked to pay for water usage in this house, or any for that matter. Our lease does not include any agreement that we will pay it. Our lease was renewed again in May. No mention of any changes, all appears to be the same. We weren't given any kind of notice that the landlord wished to change the agreement. No letter, ph call, zip.

I'm waiting for the agent to call me back. Can they make us pay this?! We weren't informed at all, and they want payment in 14 days. The agent totally downplayed my concern, and implied it wasn't much money and to just hand it over. I don't think this is right! Surely I have to sign an agreement before they can change the rules.

Help!

we only ever paid electricity - but we knew we had to pay that

isnt there a renters tribunal you can call? if youve never paid one before id be questioning it >:|

Did you re-read the contract when you re-signed the lease? Perhaps they changed some of the conditions?

:dunno:

In our case the owner pays for the provision of services (sewage etc) and we pay for the water we actually use. But we are billed separately, I only ever get the usage bill direct from the provider.

But, I do think that it is odd that they demand that you pay a bill that isn't addressed to you or in your name. If you are responsible for paying water, the agent should have set it up with the provider so that you are billed directly.

Personally I would call Consumer Affairs (or the relevant body in your state) before doing anything. If you're unsure who to contact just google renters rights in your state and you should be able to find out from there.

GL

Water usage used to be payable on your rates, but now its a separate bill, and I would guess that is why they are forwarding it to you.

I'd offer to pay half since they didn't tell you about it, and would probably be expected to pay the next ones :)

If it's not on your lease you're not liable to pay it!

i'd contact the rental tenancies board in your state and ask them. even if you are required to pay for it, there might be a time-frame in which any changes of this nature have to be enacted. and :crossfingers: that 14 days is too short a notice of those changes.

goodluck xx

FWIW with our rentals in QLD we never paid water. in the ACT and VIC we only ever paid usage (not services, sewage etc). remember that the real estate agent is only interested in the relationship with the landlord, they will push the landlords interests well before your own. the Rental board is the best number to call and query.

In the last place we rented we apparently had to pay the water bill at the end of our lease when we were moving out. The night before hand over of keys we were looking through the lease and discovered that on the last page it said we were to pay the water bill. We freaked out cause we had obviously overlooked this and we had no idea how much it would be.
When I was handing in the keys I mentioned it to the receptionist and she checked for me. She said normally we would have to pay and it would be taken out of our bond !! But since we had done alot of work for the land lords they were waiving the bill :D (3 years worth of water bill)

We were lucky in this case but we could easily have been caught out and left with next to no bond (I dont know how much the bills added up to)

Good luck getting it sorted !

How is the water metered at the property? Is it a shared meter? For example we used to live in a unit of 8 & we all shared a meter. As you can not accurately know who has used what water the landlord has to pay all charges. The water company take a reading and splits the bill by how many properties are serviced by that meter. If it is a one on one meter than normally the landlord pays, sewage, parks etc and the tenants pay the water usage. It would be like any other service ie Elec, Gas as it is what the tenant has consumed. I do remember when we sold our unit & put a lease on for 6 mths as the house we purchased had a tenant the new owner was a bit shocked at the cost of the water bill and asked us how we wanted to pay. I explained to them that it wasn't up to us to pay. It also states on the bill that it cannot be passed on to tenants. In that 6 months we paid annuals, sewage etc for our new house & the tenant paid for water consumed by them.

Sorry just saw you are on the Gold Coast so it maybe different.

We used to pay water usage but not rates. When I was a landlord I paid water rates not usage.


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On our lease the first page of the condition report had a thing about water, I had to record the water meter reading as I entered the property for the first time. It stated that we were responsable for the entire water bill. BUT where a property was NOT fitted with a water saving toilet or shower heads then we they can not charge us.

I thought this meant they can not charge us AT ALL. But then we got a bill. RE said its the excess. I don't mind paying it seems there is 7 of us! But Im sure that is not how it reads on the lease but I haven't been bothered to get it out & double check. But the RE explained that in the event that water saving things are not fitted then we are only responsible for the excess. I think thats fair enough.

But if you have your lease in front of you & there is nothing in reference to the water bill then I don't think they can make you pay it. They can not just assume you knew about it after 2 years of nothing.

In SA, owners/landlords pay up to a certain amount of supply and usage (first 136 kilo litres of the year) and then above and beyond that the tenant must pay any amounts above. This is when there is no other agreement in place, as set out by the Residential Tenancies Act. Sewerage charges are always the responsibility of the owner/landlord in SA.

When there is an agreement in place, landlords MUST provide notice as bills become due.

Contact the rental tribunal for your state (in SA its the Office of Consumer and Business Affairs) to find out what's in place for QLD. I think it's the Residential Tenancies Authority (a qld.gov website). I googled it and it has a FAQ section, stating new laws, but they must be part of your rental agreement from what I can tell.

Hope this helps. If you want more info PM me.

I'll try to answer everything without missing anyones questions, but DS is crying so I have to be super fast!

The property is a house, so the meter isn't shared with any other properties. We don't have water saving fittings as far as I know. I can't find a full copy of my entire lease document....... but I do have the renewal notice. There was a box ticked saying 'rent remains unchanged' and there was no mention of any water bills. I also did not receive any separate letter advising me of the change.

Am I mistaken though, in thinking that changes can only be made at the beginning of a new lease???? In which case, they should have told me about this in May? I have had a change-over in property manager though.... the lady who used to take care of us no longer works there, and I have some random new woman who isn't familiar with us at all.

I might just add that yes, she DID take the landlords side, and started trying to get me to have sympathy for them, saying it's not fair for them to pay our water bill. Ok, fair enough, but he's been doing it all this time, why the sudden change? I told her my only issue is with not being told in advance, and the expectation for us to pay almost immediately.

She's going to look through our full document today and get back to me. As far as I'm concerned, if there's no mention of us paying for water, they can shove this bill up their derierres. Fair enough if they want to change the deal, but they need to submit that to us IN WRITING, and wait for my agreement. When that happens, and ONLY when that happens, I'll be responsible for any water usage charges in future.

Also, I won't be paying any bills that aren't in my name, or addressed to me. I haven't even seen the entire invoice. They've sent me the back half of it and it says clearly at the top 'THIS IS NOT AN INVOICE'.

I'm going to go and have a little sook...... I'm really getting tired of things like this happening to us. We can never get ahead financially because every cent we save is ALWAYS eaten up by things like this. I wouldn't feel half as bad if this was due to my own stupidity or poor planning. But when people start springing stuff like this on you, it's sucky. Come on universe, I've had a really hard year! Give me a break and stop throwing stupid little problems like this my way. I've got bigger fish to fry!

I forgot -

PZ - Yes I re-read the contract before I signed it. :rolleyes: I actually decided against returning it to the agent as we weren't sure when or if we'd like to move out this year. So technically I'm not bound by a current lease, and can leave at any time as long as we give 2 weeks notice.

Which is what makes this more outrageous. According to them, I haven't agreed to ANYTHING and they're still putting their hands out for money, with absolutely no notice of the change.

Read your full lease, it will be in there.
In WA at least it is standard to pay all water usage, landlord pays rates.

We pay for water usage only, the owner pays the rest of the bill. The bill we receive from the agent in the owners name and then the agent states how much we owe (ie the water usage).

:hug: hun, personally i would be sitting down and writing them an e-mail mentioning the following things:
1. You have NEVER been requested to pay a water bill previously
2. You have nothing in WRITING stating that you are supposed to be paying water bills.

Just make it simple, dot points and ask that they please provide in writing anything that states you MUST pay the bill and if so when it was forwarded to you and if you signed it that you would like a copy.
If they say they DON'T have documentation that states you WILL or WILL NOT pay water ask why you haven't previously and what has changed now and that your happy to come to some agreement but that you would like it in writing.

FWIW we have ALWAYS had to pay for our water usage, landlord paid the rates side of things but we paid usage, is that not that case with all rentals???

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:hug: hun, personally i would be sitting down and writing them an e-mail mentioning the following things:
1. You have NEVER been requested to pay a water bill previously
2. You have nothing in WRITING stating that you are supposed to be paying water bills.

Just make it simple, dot points and ask that they please provide in writing anything that states you MUST pay the bill and if so when it was forwarded to you and if you signed it that you would like a copy.
If they say they DON'T have documentation that states you WILL or WILL NOT pay water ask why you haven't previously and what has changed now and that your happy to come to some agreement but that you would like it in writing.

FWIW we have ALWAYS had to pay for our water usage, landlord paid the rates side of things but we paid usage, is that not that case with all rentals???

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add to this... to forawrd copys of what you signed with this information. that way they can't just whip up something to suit.