Problems in shared student house. Advice needed please

Lady_K

Yes they do, I dont think they should have to really but they have to pay for the whole years water and thats a big bill

jennifernil

Strictly speaking, if they have a TV of their own in their own room then each TV requires a separate licence

jennifernil

Re the water...........up here it is itemised separately but paid along with the council tax. My daughter is a student, she owns her flat and rents out a room to another student. They pay no council tax, or water. I was quite surprised (but very relieved) that they didn't have to pay for water!! Especially as the flat is a band E.

On the tenancy agreement her tenant has signed it says he has to pay his share of gas, electricity,telephone, broadband and TV licence (they have it in the living room). He is very good. She pays the bills and gets communal stuff like toilet rolls and cleaning materials and he pays half. They do their own food.
I think 2 sharing is probably best, it gets complicated if there are too many to extract money from!!

Lady_K

Does anyone know how they can draw up an agreement about sharing the bills between the 3 of them? Does it have to be done through a solicitir because that would cost quite a bit wouldnt it

lynzpower

you can put all three names on the bills, Ive done this in shared houses before then if it gets to debt collector stage they chase all 3 for payment

Lady_K

Yes I guessed that but really my daughter does not want the bills unpaid because her name would be on it too and she has a clean credit rating. So what would prob happen is that they would still end up paying the bills between 2 of them rather than 3 so in the end it wouldnt really work.

I think getting a signed agreement from all of them to say they will all pay 1/3 each towards the bills would be useful in the future if it came to having to take him to the small claims court like someone suggested earlier but its just what is the best way to do that, how to ward it etc and if it needs to be done by a solicitor or they could do it themselves

They need to find out his details from the landlord too, home address etc

I dont think he will be bothered if the bills arent paid because hes already blacklisted by the sounds of it. I wouldnt be so bothered if he had the other bills in his sole name though and once pay time came they would have to go with him to pay them

jennifernil

Does the tenancy agreement not already say anything about the payment of utility bills? I would have thought it should. Perhaps it is different up here.
And of course my daughter's situation is totally different to your daughter's.

On the TV licence.........if a tv is in a room to which only one person has access then that tv requires its own licence.

Lady_K

Thanx I have asked her to get a copy of this tenancy agreement.

Its complicated coz if he doesnt pay his part of the bills what would happen if they didnt pay his part either and part of it is unpaid? How can they prove its them that has paid that part of the bill, I dont think they can unless they pay thier parts by card and get reciepts and the account would still show as not paid and in debt so the girls might get blacklisted too

katgirlie

Hiya,

Surely the simplest option would be to contact this lad's parents? I can't imagine they would allow this to continue (assuming, of course, that they are at least semi-reasonable human beings) and I should think that either they would pay off his share (seeing as it sounds like they are used to bailing him out) or give him a good boot up the backside and make him cough up.

Going forward, I would suggest they put as many bills as they can in joint names (not all companies will allow you to do this though) so that everyone is equally liable. It's a nightmare situation and one that most students encounter to one level or another, I think it's just one of those live and learn things!

Hope this helps,

Katy

katgirlie

PS I really don't think that only paying their share of the bills is going to help if it's already in one of their names. If it's named as 'The Occupier' or similar then this might work.

K