Heating cut over unpaid bills despite residents' payments

Residents at a block of flats in north-west London have been left without heating or hot water due to historic unpaid bills of £600,000, despite monthly payments being made over several years.

About 126 homes have been affected since 23 October. In a letter to residents, the developer and buildings management said about £300,000 is owed to the gas provider and £300,000 to the electricity provider.

The building's management company, Rendall & Rittner, said: "We fully recognise the seriousness of the situation and the impact it is having on residents, particularly families and those who may be vulnerable."

The freeholder did not respond to a request for comment from BBC London.

Rendell & Ritter added: "Our immediate priority is to support residents and to work with the freeholder and energy supplier to have the gas supply reinstated as quickly as possible."

Rendall & Rittner took over management of the building in Dollis Hill in May this year.

Lucy Baxter, who moved in four years ago when the building was new, said: "I have a one-year-old, so it's very difficult.

"I haven't been able to give her a bath and our flat is on a lower ground floor, so it's much colder and we're really struggling.

"There are other disabled residents here, disabled children, elderly residents and lots of families. I'm very concerned."

She said tenants had received a warning letter from a debt collection agency about three weeks earlier but had since been "left in the dark" about the situation.

But management claimed residents had been kept informed since the outage began and that it intended to hold a residents' meeting in the near future.

Baxter said owners and renters pay for their own hot water and heating usage through metered supplies managed by a company called mySycous.

"We don't actually know where that money goes afterwards.

"So we don't know what's been paid, but obviously there's a mismanagement of funds on their behalf.

"This is not just recent, it's been going on for years. It's accumulated. So I just don't understand how they've let it get this far."

Rendall & Rittner said it did not know the "full extent of the historic energy debt" when management of the development was transferred to it.

Baxter added: "I also think we need an explanation to how this happened - where our payments are going, why the funds are being so mismanaged.

"We don't want it to happen again, so we want to be assured that it's not going to happen again."

Rendall & Rittner said discussions with the freeholder and energy supplier were "continuing urgently", but it could not currently confirm when heating and hot water would be restored.

The company and the freeholder said they were providing residents with temporary heating and alternative access to shower facilities, "with further arrangements also being explored".

"We are particularly conscious that some residents may be more significantly affected by the loss of heating and hot water," they said, encouraging tenants with specific support requirements to get in touch.

Another tenant, Kaniz Gatt, said she was concerned about who would ultimately cover the cost of the temporary measures.

She said: "Portable showers outside is not going to solve the solution. We are very concerned. Who is going to pay for those showers?

"All I just can't believe that this is happening to us in the UK as well and that this was allowed in the first place. It's not the residents' fault."

The buildings management said any historic costs that are "properly recoverable" through service or heat charges would need to be reviewed and apportioned before individual charges could be confirmed.

Gatt added: "I'm very, very anxious because, it's my right, and I worked so hard to buy this apartment and it's out of my control."

A Rendall & Rittner spokesperson said that the "historic financial position is also being reviewed" including "the previous budgeting and recovery of energy costs, heat tariff and metering arrangements, and sums outstanding in relation to the development".

"As that work remains ongoing, it would not be appropriate for us to speculate about responsibility for the historic shortfall or to suggest at this stage what individual residents may ultimately be asked to pay," they added.

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