Are we liable to pay for new tenants phone connection?

lillemy

We have recently moved out of a privately rented property.

When we moved in the telephone lines were disconnected. I work from home and had informed the landlord about this and that I would require a business line, which was fine with them. When the BT engineer came around he informed that the 3 existing phone points did not support broadband and that he needed to put in another point that would support broadband at high speed. I told the landlords after it had been done and they said that there was no problem.

Now we have moved out and new tenants have moved in, and the new tenants are complaining about having to pay the reconnection fee to BT.

The landlord tells us that we are liable to pay for this installation and is withholding our deposit.

My question is; can they legally do this? The contract says nothing about this issue at all, it only mentions us being liable to pay the telephone bills. And I thought that new tenants always had to pay installation or reconnection fees, after all we payed when we moved in, so shouldn't have to pay for the new tenants too!

It has been 10 working days today since we moved out and they are still withholding our deposit.

Any advice would be appreciated, thank you.

Judith_W

I'm sure someone will come along with more info, but basically if the existence of a line was not in the original inventory, then you are not required to leave a working line when you leave. You only have to leave the place in the same situation as you found it.

mynameisdave

I used to work for Openreach and without going into a long winded description about how BT uses its lineplant... The LL is wrong.

clutton_2

""new tenants are complaining about having to pay the reconnection fee to BT.

The landlord tells us that we are liable to pay for this installation and is withholding our deposit. ""


anyone who moves into a new property has to pay for a line to be connected or a reconnection fee.... landlords rarely pay for this service for their tenants... Fees are not normally payable on exit... but .. if you paid for a fixed term contract with your phone line supplier there may be costs outstanding which could be yours to pay.. have you talked to your old line supplier ?

However, this is between you and the phone company and nothing to do with your LL


is your deposit in a deposit protection scheme ? if so - just raise a Dispute ...

is he a new landlord ?

westv

I don't quite understand. There should only be one connection fee - the connection that was done when you moved in. For all other tenants it should just be a matter of the account being transferred into their name.

lillemy

Thanks for all the replies guys.

clutton: The phone line and broadband was paid for by my employer, and disconnected on the last day of our tenancy. So there are no outstanding bills. They are new landlords, yes, and are apparently being advised by the estate agent that we are liable to pay for the new tenants phone line reconnection...

Westv: As it was a business line paid for by my employer the new tenants have to get a residential line instead.

westv

So perhaps they thought, like I did, that it was a domestic connection and therefore should have continued after the tenancy. I assume you did tell the EA that it was business use.

mynameisdave

That it is a business line isn't necessarily that important, if it is a standard phone line with normal broadband its the same stuff whether it is business or residential. The B or R is the nature of the account, not physical attributes of a line.

When a tenant or homeowner moves house they tell BT such and BT arrange a date to stop the line so that account is ended. It costs them money to send someone out to physically do this at a propertry and would cost them money to physically send someone if and when the new residents wants to have their own connection so its all done at the telephone exchange.

Normally it is just a matter of the switch at the exchange to restart the new service but if another order for a nearby property is placed and there is no spare line plant (could be a connection in the green cabinets you see at the side of the road, or at the DP near the property) then BT will cease the line they have previously stopped and reuse the lineplant as this is in turn cheaper and easier than expanding the network capacity.

What that means now is that the incomming tenant has to pay for an engineer to come out and do all the rejigging when BT find more lineplant be it expansion or a 'pair-divert'. There is absolutely no way a tenant can guarantee that the line would still be working unless they do not close their account with BT and continue to pay line rental and any calls made should someone plug a phone in and start dialling.

westv

I've moved house several times over the years and have never had to pay for a BT line to be re-connected.

westv

Also being charged a reconnection fee because "another order for a nearby property is placed and there is no spare line plant" seems a bit rough considering that it's normally free.

sooz

if you still have access to the property, or can speak to the new occupier, see if they can dial 17070.

if this offers them an automated message with a number, they can recall BT with this number.

It should then be free for them to reconnect.

The trouble is, since BT were forced to open to competition, they subcontractracted to openreach the reconnection part. If you can show there is an active phone line, even if disconnected, reconnection should be free.