Common Stair electricity charges

Dave1979

Our factors have been in touch to tell us that due to an error the stair has never been charged for the common area electricity since the development was built in 2000. They are thankfully not back charging it but the first bill came in and it’s £28 a month for each of the 8 flats. This seems a little high for essentially 10 lightbulbs and the door entry system and given my own combined gas/electricity bill is £35 total for my flat!!

What do other people pay in similar situations?

niktheguru

That seems pretty ridiculous. Have you asked them if they are using LED bulbs and not candescent lights!

Mickey666

Are you sure they are not back-charging or is there a misprint in the letter?  £2.80 would seem more appropriate for 10 LED bulbs and an intercom!

dogshome

Forgiving all the charges from 2000 up to the present day?

For a start the State of Limitations bars them from billing anything prior to 2014 / 2015, so at £28 a flat it looks as though they are trying to recover the unbilled power from at least those dates till now - 8x 28 is £224 - Ask to see the Bills 

Dave1979

dogshome said:

Forgiving all the charges from 2000 up to the present day?

For a start the State of Limitations bars them from billing anything prior to 2014 / 2015, so at £28 a flat it looks as though they are trying to recover the unbilled power from at least those dates till now - 8x 28 is £224 - Ask to see the Bills 

Definitely written off. The meter wasn’t registered when the flats were completed. Weirdly just our stair and not the other ones in the development.

Think it would be near impossible to track down all the previous owners of the flats in the 20 years to bill them.

QrizB

Dave1979 said:

... it’s £28 a month for each of the 8 flats. This seems a little high for essentially 10 lightbulbs and the door entry system ...

£28/month for 8 flats is £224/month, ~£7.50/day, or roughly 48kWh/day (effectively a 2kW constant load). If the lightbulbs are 200W each and are lit 24/7 that would add up but otherwise it does seem a little odd.

lohr500

If the meter/s for the other stair ways have been working, I would ask a few of the residents how much they are being charged and if they get details of the consumption. If you have access to the meter for your stair way, you could take a look at the consumption over a few days. It will obviously depend on if the lights are on 24/7, or triggered by motion sensors and/or dusk/dawn sensors. But if you could keep them on for 10 minutes and check the meter, it would give an indication of the consumption which you could scale up to a full  month. The door access system shouldn't draw too much current, even to energise any magnetic latches.