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If water charges are increased on a rental property and the letting agent has not informed us of this can we refuse to pay the increase?
I am trying to help my brother with a problem he is having with his letting agent. They have just sent out a water bill where the unit price has increased but the agency has not given any written notice of this. He has phoned our local water company and they said that they would have written to the owner of the property and told them that the price was going increasing. The letting agent has admitted they did not contact him about this and just said this is your bill and it needs paying. Can they do this?
Your brother is almost certainly required to pay utility and service charges as part of his lease. If the water charges have been increased by the water company he will almost certainly be responsible for the payment. These should be billed on by the agency at cost but if they are properly incurred and the unit cost has increased, while it would have been a courtesy to inform your brother of this he still is responsible for paying them.
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