Parliament green-lights direct utility bills for tenants
In some instances, when tenants vacate apartments, the owner has to take responsibility for unpaid bills.
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By
Mariyam Umna Ismail
Parliament on Monday passed an amendment to the Utility Regulatory Authority Act to make it easier for the tenant to be billed directly for utility services instead of billing the owner for a rented building or apartment.
As of now, bills for rented premises are sent to the landlord. In some instances, when tenants leave the place, the owner has to take responsibility for unpaid bills.
The report prepared by the parliament's environment committee after reviewing the bill submitted by Kela MP Ibrahim Shareef on behalf of the government was passed with a vote of 57 lawmakers at Monday's sitting.
The government has stated that the bill was introduced to:
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Ease the difficulties created by bill tenure for the people in paying their utility bills
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Resolve any billing issues in such a manner that the rights of both the service provider and the customer are protected
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Establishing billing services rules
The Regulatory Authority Act amendment was sent to the committee for review in June. During the study phase of the bill, the committee met utility service providers and sought their suggestions. Some of the points that the committee noted from these discussions were:
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Since most of the households are rented premises and their metres are registered in the name of the landlord, the bill is levied on the landlord rather than the person who avails the service through separated metres
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Service providers and service recipients face conflicts due to this
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Sometimes the landlord is levied unpaid utility bills when their tenants leave the premises without paying for the services they used
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Since the landlord is named responsible for such bills, it becomes difficult for the service providers to recover payments for such bills
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The presence of a metre in the landlords name makes it difficult for the people to attain government subsidy from service providers
The committee proposed an important amendment to the bill to address the issue through legislation. The amendment states:
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In public utility services, metres should be registered in the name of the building owner
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However, if the service is not used by the person registered with, registration can be changed to the name of the user
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The authority should formulate a regulation specifying the rules and procedures in consultation with the providers of public utility services
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Those who have registered for the service will be held responsible for the bills incurred for the period registered
