Bad tenants / utility meters ...

rustie

Hi there...
Hopefully somebody here can advise me...

We rented our house out via a letting agent who has failed miserably on so many levels (that's another very long story!) and are due to take possession of the house this Friday. A month ago we found out that the tenants have not being paying their gas & electricity bills so Scottish Power + Eon installed prepay meters (perfectly reasonable - I have no problem with that) And the tenants will be paying for the removal of these meters - this can take up to a week. In the meantime, we are stuck with using 'new' prepaid cards for gas and electricity.

However - the agent informs us that once the meters are removed, Scottish Power want a 'deposit' of £150 from us before they will supply...

My questions...
1. Do Scottish Power have the right to demand a deposit before they supply?
2. What happens if we don't want Scottish Power as suppliers? Surely we should be able to choose our provider?

And yes, I will be writing to the Property Ombudsman about this 'agent' and requesting compensation for this plus additional costs due to his mismanagement of the property...not least the fact that he knew there was an additional tenant who was not on the lease, he allowed a dog when we specifically said no pets, ditto smokers...the list goes on...oh, and no inventory was taken prior to the let...
We have been out of the country so could not visit the property and were paying for a full managed service.

Thanks for any advice...
Rustie

misterstingy

This sounds spookily like what happened to me.

My tenants said they would pay for returning the meters to the normal type, but of course when they found out how much it costs, they didn't bother.

Scottish Power wanted an installation fee (I think £35 but don't quote me) plus the £ 150 deposit. I withheld the money from the tenants' deposit. Tenants shouted down the phone and threatened me, but in the end they paid the elec co. and I returned the money to them from their deposit.

1. Do Scottish Power have the right to demand a deposit before they supply?

Yup.

2. What happens if we don't want Scottish Power as suppliers? Surely we should be able to choose our provider?

Takes a long time to arrange and still costs money.

I now have a better agent, and a very good tenant. My advice is to go into all the letting agents in town and talk to them. If they are mature people who obviously know what they are talking about, you're on to a winner.

If they are young and gormless, then move on.

It's a pain doing the footwork, but more than pays you back in the long run.

chanz4

rustie wrote: »

Hi there...
Hopefully somebody here can advise me...

We rented our house out via a letting agent who has failed miserably on so many levels (that's another very long story!) and are due to take possession of the house this Friday. A month ago we found out that the tenants have not being paying their gas & electricity bills so Scottish Power + Eon installed prepay meters (perfectly reasonable - I have no problem with that) And the tenants will be paying for the removal of these meters - this can take up to a week. In the meantime, we are stuck with using 'new' prepaid cards for gas and electricity.

However - the agent informs us that once the meters are removed, Scottish Power want a 'deposit' of £150 from us before they will supply...

My questions...
1. Do Scottish Power have the right to demand a deposit before they supply?

Yes as you are requesting credit, they also don't have an obligation to change them.

2. What happens if we don't want Scottish Power as suppliers? Surely we should be able to choose our provider?

Yes you can change, it takes 28 days and no guarantee as suppliers are seeing as none essential work

And yes, I will be writing to the Property Ombudsman about this 'agent' and requesting compensation for this plus additional costs due to his mismanagement of the property...not least the fact that he knew there was an additional tenant who was not on the lease, he allowed a dog when we specifically said no pets, ditto smokers...the list goes on...oh, and no inventory was taken prior to the let...
We have been out of the country so could not visit the property and were paying for a full managed service.

In regards to this, unless its in writing it didn't happen.