Fabio,
I would and suspect some of the DR1?ers would like to get your spin on the following subject.
It has been common practice when an owner or renter in a private residential or condo association is believed to be behind in paying maintenance fees for services and utilities the administrator will and without reasonable warning, if any; cut off utility services such as water or gas to the residence to force payment. Unfortunately, some of the cuts take place on weekends after the billing office is closed. Another variation of this behavior is the water bill is paid and the maintenance is not, but the administrator will cut off the water supply to get attention.
Two of my friends living under different administrators have been recent victims of this type of practice and it was unjustified. They both had been up to date in payments and had the receipts. The administrators were in error, their billing files did record recent payments of the friends.
Let?s just for the sake of argument say there is no contract between the parties stating the terms of payment other than a bill is sent from the administrator to the resident stating the billing amount and to pay on or before a due date.
What is a reasonable time to send a bill out before the payment due date?
What is the legal requirement of the administrator when a bill is behind to reasonably notify the resident that services will be cut off? An example of this is if a resident is behind 5 days or more, can the administrator cut service? How much notice does he give: none, 24 hours, or 5 business days?
What can a resident do or say to immediately return service, if service cut without reasonable notice or if service cut in error?
Another scenario of this behavior is residents will prepay bills when they going to be absent from their home for long length of time, months. During this absence the fees go up without notice. When the resident returns he finds no utilities and a past due bill.
What reasonable precautions do you suggest to prevent this?
Should victims of an unjustified cut off be compensated for loss of service? It will never happen, but PJT is asking anyway.
Regards,
PJT
I would and suspect some of the DR1?ers would like to get your spin on the following subject.
It has been common practice when an owner or renter in a private residential or condo association is believed to be behind in paying maintenance fees for services and utilities the administrator will and without reasonable warning, if any; cut off utility services such as water or gas to the residence to force payment. Unfortunately, some of the cuts take place on weekends after the billing office is closed. Another variation of this behavior is the water bill is paid and the maintenance is not, but the administrator will cut off the water supply to get attention.
Two of my friends living under different administrators have been recent victims of this type of practice and it was unjustified. They both had been up to date in payments and had the receipts. The administrators were in error, their billing files did record recent payments of the friends.
Let?s just for the sake of argument say there is no contract between the parties stating the terms of payment other than a bill is sent from the administrator to the resident stating the billing amount and to pay on or before a due date.
What is a reasonable time to send a bill out before the payment due date?
What is the legal requirement of the administrator when a bill is behind to reasonably notify the resident that services will be cut off? An example of this is if a resident is behind 5 days or more, can the administrator cut service? How much notice does he give: none, 24 hours, or 5 business days?
What can a resident do or say to immediately return service, if service cut without reasonable notice or if service cut in error?
Another scenario of this behavior is residents will prepay bills when they going to be absent from their home for long length of time, months. During this absence the fees go up without notice. When the resident returns he finds no utilities and a past due bill.
What reasonable precautions do you suggest to prevent this?
Should victims of an unjustified cut off be compensated for loss of service? It will never happen, but PJT is asking anyway.
Regards,
PJT
