Tenant organises own electrical work with big fee....

C

Corporategirl

We have a duplex and a great (elderly) tenant. Last Saturday night his power went out and he organised a local electrician to come and do repairs. He didn't contact our PM and did this on his own. Some done on the sat night and the rest on the Monday morning. Bill was $770 which the tenant paid by cheque.

PM rang us to tell us and said whilst they have given the tenant a talking to - how do we want to pay the tenant.

Our thoughts are - if the $770 is over the top then do we have to pay the total or can we just pay market rate?

Also we have telephoned insurance company to see if we have a claim. We need further info from the electrician (what caused the fault and if the switchboard was repaired) who did the job and asked PM to obtain this. They said that could only get a bit of detail and we can ring to follow up.

Is this all too hard and we just pay or do we push back and get the PM to do some more work re:insurance info and find out about market value for the work?
 
If they expect you to pay then they Must supply a detailed invoice explaining the fault and exactly what they did to repair it.

The ATO and the insurance company will both want this, so make sure you get it before you pay.

After you know what went wrong, then you decide who is responsible for it and what you are going to do about it.
 
I had a window broken in my commercial property over the weekend, didn't get it fixed until Monday, was OK with tenant, weekend rates to get it replaced $550.00 - replaced Monday $250.00.

$770 doesn't seem unreasonable for an urgent power repair, would you want your elderly tenant to be without power over the weekend? this is a cost of being an owner of a rental property, my advice - pay up :D
 
balwoges said:
I had a window broken in my commercial property over the weekend, didn't get it fixed until Monday, was OK with tenant, weekend rates to get it replaced $550.00 - replaced Monday $250.00.

$770 doesn't seem unreasonable for an urgent power repair, would you want your elderly tenant to be without power over the weekend? this is a cost of being an owner of a rental property, my advice - pay up :D
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I dont think the OP is disputing the work needed doing but they wanted to be made aware of it so they could consider options or at least understand the problem.

Difficult situation.
 
Really need to find outwhat was done. If it was $770 to come turn on a circuit breaker, then thats a rort. If it was a serious fault then it could be fine.

May have been ancillary work, eg a burnt out fuse casing which then needed an RCD fitted by law for any new work to the board.

Or I had an IP a few months ago where they had no power. My sparky went out and found a burnt out board plus the lead in cable to the board smouldering. Made the whole thing safe and it was then $385 for a new board and $660 for a level 2 sparky to replace the leadin cable.
 
$300 would be a min. cost just to get them out for an after hrs/weekend rate. In NSW tenant can authorise up to $1500 for emergency call out and owner has to pay.

I had a call from a tenant on Saturday at 5.20pm to state that the toilet pipe is leaking from upstairs through the ceiling to down stairs. he stated he has turned off the tap and it has stop running. Can i send a plumber out asap. I asked how long the problem has been happening and they stated since Friday but was to busy to call me and Saturday Night or Sunday is better for them I stated I am not paying for after hrs call, you should of called me on Friday or even sat am for normal rate repairs. i stated you have two other toilets use them and leave the other off until Monday!!
 
The lease may contain the numbers of the agent's preferred contractors and these should have been used in the first instance. Otherwise they should have contacted the agent who would have had the preferred contacts on their voice mail message. At the end of the day, what would be the price difference between the outcome and what you would have paid anyway? - Is it worth chasing?
 
I've been in this situation before, I ended up going halves on the excessive price tenant has paid without contacting my PM first.

In my situation, my PM find out details of the work done. Then get a quote to see how much for them to get someone to do that same work on a Saturday night. Then use it as a basis of negotiation.

While in NSW tenant can authorise up to $1000 for emergency call out, it is not a blank cheque for the tenant to pay excessively over market rate for work done. And they must contact the landlord or agent about the problem or made a reasonable attempt to do so, and has to give the landlord or agent a reasonable opportunity to get the repairs done.
 
Detailed invoice is required, as the tenant didn't even attempt to contact PM I'd only pay market rate.

What's your insurance excess? $770 seems like a small amount to claim on insurance.
 
balwoges said:
On a Saturday night?
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I manage my own property and would expect a phone call from the tenant regardless of the date or time. If i wasn't immediately contactable i would have no issue with him arranging the work himself. As I said, i would like the opportunity to arrange the emergency call out for him.
 
Hi All,

What is right by law is often very different to practice so I wouldn't get hung up on the issue of not being contacted first other then to ask the PM to convey the message in writing that further unauthorized repairs completed will not be reimbursed where contact with the landlord/agent had not been attempted first.

The PM can then go on to say that on this occasion the invoice will be re-reimbursed on the proviso that you receive a copy of the service/work order & invoice, plus certificate of electrical safety.

At the end of the day a great tenant is a blessing.

Cheers,

Rud.
 
Good luck getting a detailed invoice from the tradie. I am still waiting for a detailed invoice from a plumbing company for work done the first weekend in December.
 
kennyboi said:
I've been in this situation before, I ended up going halves on the excessive price tenant has paid without contacting my PM first.
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If the tenant only had a cordless phone in the premises - then with a power outage, he wouldn't have been able to contact the PM.

I think more info is required before giving advice ... what was the fault and what needed to be done to rectify it?
 
Any news on what the work was and break up of the costings.

To help my tenants I had fridge magnets made up with our emergency contact numbers for plumber, electrician and my mobile for everything else. Size of a business card and easy for tenant to find and not expensive to have made up.
 
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