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Thread: University Accommodation & Joint Bills

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    Formerly known as Andehh Andeh13's Avatar
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    University Accommodation & Joint Bills

    This is on behalf of my girlfriend.

    My girlfriend & her friend found a nice house to live last July for their final year at university. Because they had an extra room they advertised it out & found an Austrian girl to take it. The Austrian girl moved in at the start of August and setup up all the gas & elec bills, linking them to her bank account. She setup a direct debit paying them the estimated amount each month, and all was well. My gf & her friend wired the money to The Austrian girl & it was then taken out of her account each month.

    Come January the Austrian girl spoke to npower & they advised her to add the names of my gf & her friend onto the bill, which they did in good faith. Now, they paid the bills via direct debit each month, the money comming out of the the Austrain girl's account. To save hassle (my gf was pregnant & was due in may) & the fact that the student loan had come in, my gf & her friend paid the Austrian girl the amount due for the 5 months up until they moved out. This came to £170 (£34 * 5) to cover the bills for jan, Feb, March, April & May, upon which they would move out. That way they wouldn't have to fanny around each month paying the money in. When my gf & her friend moved out at the end of May the Austrain girl would cover the costs on her own (she is the only one left in the house as she is living there for a 2nd year with some new tenants). The Austrian girl was perfectly happy with this & agreed that their names would be taken off around May.

    Now May arrived and my girlfriend called up to take her name off the account as she had paid her share of it all. The only problem was Npower told her that they were in £340 worth of debt. My gf couldn't figure out how this happened until Npower told her that the direct debit had been cancelled on April 16th by the Austrian girl for no apparent reason (She claimed it was end of May), without my gf's or her friends knowledge.

    Now the Austrian girl is ignoring (she has a thick accent & isnt easy to understand over the phone so everything is via e-mail & txt - though iv asked gf to call her tomorrow) any mention of the fact that the money was all paid in January and the fact sh eis effectively askign my gf & her friend to pay for April & May twice (£70 worth).



    Now, Is there anything my gf can do to get her name taken off the account? Npower initially said not until they get their money, but the fact that they allowed the Austrian girl to cancel the direct debit without informing/asking for permission from my gf or her friend is what got them into such a mess. Had the direct debits been continued then the money would have been taken out & the bills would have been paid. Surely Npower needs to inform everyone when such a change is made to an account. When we had a bank account open with HSBC for my uni house we could barely ask the balance of it without half of us signing something giving our permissions.

    Thanks guys, i know asking for advice is a long shot but figured it was worth a try!

    edit; The £340 includes bills for June & July aswell, which is when the Austrian girl was living there on her home - she is covering those herself, hence the above numbers not all adding up exactly.
    Last edited by Andeh13; 12-07-2009 at 11:54 PM.

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    Pseudo-Mad Scientist Whiternoise's Avatar
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    Re: University Accommodation & Joint Bills

    Firstly, wave a bank statement in her face, she can't deny that even with a dodgy accent. Numbers are the same in all languages.

    Secondly, ring Citizens Advice. NPower are probably within their rights to not take names off until they get paid, but check through the terms and conditions to see if they have to inform you if payment isn't sent. In theory they probably "did" tell your girlfriend, but as the notification went to the house and she wasn't there, sadly legally "ignorance isn't an excuse".

    Thirdly, i'm a little confused. Your gf and her friend pay for their share of the bills up until May, and then Austrian girl cancels the entire direct debit in April? I'm not entirely sure where this £340 debt comes from (well i can see, but i don't understand!).

    It seems like she's shot herself in the foot quite badly though, she's cancelled direct debit for the whole house when she's the only one living there? Wouldn't Npower cut the electricity if you haven't paid?
    Last edited by Whiternoise; 13-07-2009 at 12:54 AM. Reason: being a numpty

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    Re: University Accommodation & Joint Bills

    Check how the names are added to the account ASAP. It's very rare that companies allow more than one 'account holder' to stop issues like this.

    There is most likely one main account holder - ask them who this currently is. I've been in a similar situation myself. Even though names were on the account, this simply meant people could access information and changing certain things if needed.

    I suspect what she may have done is tried to transfer the account holder to one of the other 2 girls, and then cancelled the DD. The company would have wanted to speak to your girlfreind before doing this, but it's not unknown that people have faked others in situations like this.
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    Re: University Accommodation & Joint Bills

    Scraping the bottom of the barrel here, but is there a chance that Austrian girl cancelled the debit in April because she was trying to get the names off in time for the end of May?

    If I remember nPower, then like a lot of the utility companies you need to give them a few weeks for changes and whatnot to occur (this was a pain in the rear living in a property for a year).

    Also, they probably would have figured out they're serving a uni house. You might find they're less lenient..

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    Re: University Accommodation & Joint Bills

    I had a similar issue at the end of my uni time - luckily the bill had everyone's name on it, then when one of the chaps decided to try and scam his way out of not paying the final bill, I simply paid my share directly to the gas/power company and along with a note asking that they take my name off the bill as I'd cleared all my share of the bill, and that any further payments should be taken up with those other names on the bill.

    Some people simply just go home and leave no forwarding address, but my landlord had our names and home addresses to avoid such a thing - still didn't stop one of them from trying it on though.

    (The cheeky fecker tried to skip his last rent too, by claiming that he left the rental money with me!)
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    Formerly known as Andehh Andeh13's Avatar
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    Re: University Accommodation & Joint Bills

    Stoo - thats what we did in my house, as we eached paid our share of the bill our names were taken off!

    Just to clarify my gf & her friend paid their shares all the way up until the end of the year. Not only because the student loan had just to come in (one less thing to budget in) but also she was heavily pregnant & was hoping to avid this mess when our daughter arrived! This way the Austrain girl had the money going in her account & each month the direct debit would be taken out until may, in which case everyone would be square with npower minus any credit they'd share out. Thats the way it should have happened. The fact that she is asking for this additional money makes me think she stopped the direct debit so that it built up & then tried to blag it as additional usage that they had to share - She didn't tell anyone she had stopped the direct debit so without checking with npower, it would have looked like it did.

    When the Austrian girl cancelled the direct debit in April the debt backed up & got to the point the Austrian girl couldn't afford it, hence (i think) her turning round to my gf & her friend ans saying they need to (re)pay her for April & May.

    The remainder of the £340 came from the Austrian girl living in the house for June & July and managing to go over the estimated bills.

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