Adz and Joe get my votes.

Rossco, you owe the money for excess water if it is in your lease(s) terms and conditions past and present. This is a simple mistake blown out of proportion.

The PM should have been brighter and dealt with it by calling you, advising the "breach" was an office system, apologised and discussed a payment plan to suit etc but they didn't. People are idiots - you are well aware of that and your PM showed they have no people skills.

So, check your leases and if you owe for "excess water" than make a payment plan.

By the way Joe - I can't get water corp to post excess water to tenants directly either.

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Not arguing, but I don't know that it would be void...the age old 'I never got an invoice' is the typical response when it comes to any demands for money, whether truthful or just stalling tactics. I think if the agent had common sense they would withdraw it & set up a payment plan if there has been a legit error & it hasn't been sent out for whatever reason. Their trust accounting records will show when the invoice is added too, depends if they keep a mail register to see if it was sent. Even if it was to go so far as Tribunal you just agree to a payment plan & she's apples.

We couldn't with our system (REST), the money came in but had to be manually allocated to rent or invoices, if it was an odd amount it was put on hold & the tenant was called to specify what the money is for. Maybe it was just configured that way for our office though? I wasn't sure if they were allowed to put it to whatever they like when it is obviously for rent etc. Once again may have just been our company policy.

I don't really understand why they hadn't sent you any late notices or even called just to see where you are at...instead just throw a breach at you. It's no suprise why PM's get bad names when there's people who just truely don't give a shit & get on a bit of a power trip. That's pretty much why I left, got sick of everyone thinking I was full of shit or a heartless bastard when in fact I would do absolutely anything possible to help them out & did on a number of occasions with no thanks.

Agree that it sounds like your PM wants to do as little as possible in their job & doesn't understand the concept of fixing the problem before it becomes a bigger one such as now.

Also 100% agree on never calling the owner direct (unless you already know them), all it will do is piss off the PM or the owner (or both) more that you are undermining the others authority. PM will just be more motivated to move you out of the property.

The short of it is:

1. Someone in their office had no idea how to manage the rental accounts.

2. They paid water bills without sending/mailing any notification to the tennant (me) or me paying anything above my normal fortnightly rent...The person in question taking funds directly from rent paid only.

3. That person juggled the payments to deflect/hide/nullify the errors they were making....For 3 years!...So much for them have any form of internal Auditing process, that would have uncovered the issue YEARS ago.

I now have a list of the rental account activity for this address & all of my tennancy...Thank you REBA - consumer protection.

There are LOTS of positive & negative fund adjustments since MAY 2008, in addition to the normal rental incoming/outgoing payments.....up to 6 +/- transactions on the same day for varying amounts......ALL listed as water consumption.............

I'm taking this document to an accountant to run through.....It would appear the water bill issue is the tip of the iceberg, covering for some other major management issue.

I have been informed the water bills are sent to the agent quarterly......How can I have a $250 variance in 2 bills over 6 months? (look at my original post for the billed amounts) Am I paying part of the owners WATER RATES?

Can someone who live in a normal house with 2 occupants please inform me of the cost of their last 2 water bills please.

I'n not trying to find a way to get out of paying anything I actually owe, but on the other hand I want to be sure I'm not being fucked over & paying for someone elses mis-management or fraud.

Cheers Gents.

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Rossco, I can tell you a house a house of 4, I don't get water bills that high ever and believe me when I say, we don't heed the water corps warnings of short showers etc..

ross you can ask to see the water accounts, then you can put the dates together to make sure that you are not paying the rates

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~$50 per quarter is the norm for a couple. I did wonder WTF was going on with the massive bills...do you have retic?

To be correct - tenant is not allowed to pay anything other than rent, any other cost (water usage etc.) must be paid to the owner in COMPENSATION for the owner paying the bill. Meaning the owner has to "suffer the loss" first on any account before then can seek to be refunded by the tenant. Not that it has any relevance but keep it in mind in case there's shifty buggers around.

By the sounds of the leger you have, in May 08 they decided to use some of the rent paid to put to water & it's been a mess ever since.

I'd ask for the copy of all water accounts to double check your records & make sure you aren't paying a quarterly rates installment, they can't refuse it & can blank out owners address if it's on there. FYI down in Albany a quarterly water rates installment was about the $200-300 mark.

Totally agree with this point. I was more implying if it were to go further (court) the agent would need to justify and show evidence for the reason of the breach. As the ledger and invoice history would clearly indicate that they had not been issued accordingly, and should rossco's payments match the exact values for 'rent', should they breach for a non-payment of 'rent' it would be shown that he had infact paid the 'rent' and not the 'outgoings'. Breach is therefore void. -Simple case of incorrect wording being enough to get out of an issue (as is the case with MANY modified leases)



Definitely can do with REST - can also allocate partial funds to other areas etc etc. Fantastic that your office has this setup different and the 'common sense' to actually take the time and query something that seems odd! Unfortunately not the case with many offices who lack in training/taking the time to set up their system correctly.

+1!!

Absolute truth!! Well especially from a commercial sense, with residential it just shifts you to the bottom of a pile Know your lease inside out. It makes things clear as day for the responsibilities for the agent/tenant/owner. Take the emotion out of it and you'll get much further than an abusive phone call. It will also set a precendent should other issues arise in the future for the agency.

Internal audits? In my experience no chance, unfortunately you're expecting a $40k per year property manager to take full responsibility for the works of an agency. To put it simply - most don't/won't care until an issue arises and someone makes a scene.

You could ask for a full reconcilliation to be made by the agent - This shows all accounts/invoices issued (and dates) and also all incoming payments (and dates). It's pretty simple to do yourself as it helps to display where money should have been allocated (again, should the agent present their ledger in a court scenario - it would appear OBVIOUS that funds have been allocated towards the outgoings and not rent)

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That's what I received today via REBA - the full reconciliation/ledger from 2008- to date.

Reba used the word fraud & received an immediate response from the agency.

Reba said the breach would have been issued as a scare/bully tactic to get me to pay without raising any questions.....Wrong person to try that tactic on.

I don'y blame the pm herself, but I Do blame the agengies acounting practices.

P.s yes retic installed but I switched it off 18 months ago & hand watered during summer. Showers here are 10 mins or less between 2 people daily, no dish washer, 2 loads of washing a week.

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