CUTTING OFF POWER SUPPLY

buddyo

Energy Providers can cut power off if you don't pay your bill right? I'm renting an apartment out to a tenant who won't pay their bill, it has a seperate meter but I wanted the account to remain in my name. Can I cut it off and if not, why not?

Effects

You should have had it transferred into their name. You’ll be responsible for paying it now as far as I know.

You could look into getting it change to a pay as you go meter.

In the mean time you could have an electrician disconnect and lock it so I can’t be reconnected.

Might be in breach of your landlords responsibilities though.

amcalester

You’re not an energy provider.

Pay the arrears and transfer the account into he tenants name, then if he doesn’t pay he’ll be cut off.

rgodard80a

Effects wrote: »

You’ll be responsible for paying it now as far as I know.

+1

We had a tenant who worked on fishing trawlers and must've left the heating on while they were away for weeks. Ran up a €1000+ bill.

Luckily we had the foresight to put it in his name otherwise it's our name on the bill and our debt.

I imagine that debt can/should be taken out of their deposit when they leave, assuming it will cover the bills.

Also, there's typically a reconnection charge that also should be taken into account.

Graham

buddyo wrote: »

Can I cut it off and if not, why not?

No.

Because you stand a good chance of finding yourself on the wrong side of an RTB hearing where you'll end up paying your tenant for the privilege of not paying their electricity bill.

GGTrek

buddyo wrote: »

Energy Providers can cut power off if you don't pay your bill right? I'm renting an apartment out to a tenant who won't pay their bill, it has a seperate meter but I wanted the account to remain in my name. Can I cut it off and if not, why not?

The quality of advice given to the OP in this thread is really poor. Very few suggestions of what you can do now. Just: no don't do it, or "you should have".



I had a smart-arse tenant like yours around 18 months ago (it is a long story on how he got to be a tenant of mine), but among other breaches of the tenancy agreement he was not paying electricity like yours (he really thought he was smart until I got all the proof and start to put serious pressure including legal pressure to get the FO).
What happened was that he was co-tenant with a decent fellow and when the other fellow, tired of his behaviour left, he closed his electricity account and gave the smart-arse name to the electricity company, in 6 months he never once answered the letters or calls of the electricity company and put the electricity account in his name and did non pay the bills while consuming. I discovered this when the electricity company, knowing I was the owner, called me to say they were going to cut within a few weeks. I was really happy they called me since I finally had a real good reason to kick him out.
- First thing I did was to tell the the electricity company to cut the electricity supply since I was not going to pay and it was not in my name.

- then I put a 14 days breach of contract notice for non payment of utility bill to the door of the smart-arse, this is the legal background:
http://www.irishstatutebook.ie/eli/2004/act/27/enacted/en/print#sec16
- https://www.rtb.ie/docs/default-source/notice-of-terminations-landlord-pdf/breach-of-tenant-obligations-2.pdf?sfvrsn=2
"where the lease or tenancy agreement provides that any charges or taxes are payable by the tenant, pay those charges or taxes in accordance with the lease or tenancy agreement (unless provision to that effect in the lease or tenancy agreement is unlawful or contravenes any other enactment),"
- then when the 14 days expired a 28 days termination notice was served

- then the electricity company came to cut his electricity in January (with electric heating ) this really woke his s... brain up and he paid the full bill (more than 530 eur)
- then on same date of expiry of termination notice I took him to RTB adjudication for overholding and the notice was declared valid and he agreed to a quick date for vacating the flat (he was receiving an average of a written notice per week at the time due to multiple breaches) + emails and phone calls asking for explanations (there were multiple breaches), it does not matter if the tenant pays the bill after the termination notice has been served, the tenant has 14 days to comply and that's it. I committed an error once to withdraw a termination notice with a real POS, I never committed such error again, once I decide to serve there is no turning back especially for breach of tenant obligation.

In your case, the only good suggestion I can see is the following:
1) serve him the 14 days warning notice according to RTB standards
2) once 15 days have passed, change the account to pay as you go and serve him a termination notice. It is just not worth keeping a leech inside your property.

The current law is too tenant friendly to just give an inch.