Shared water meter

[Linhdieu01]

i currently rented a commercial shop on the ground floor
Basically the main water meter is installed in the shop and the building got 2 flats above with sub meters and the bills for my business is calculated for the whole building.
i tried to contact the letting agent of the 2 flats above and ask them to sort this out but they refuse they said it is my responsibility to contact the tenants of the flats myself about this.
I do not know where i stand in this situation as i only rent out the shop below and i dont want to pay the bill for the whole building.
i tried to contact the water supply company and they doesn’t give out any resolution for this matter
Hope anyone can help me

[nukecad]

Unless the tenants of the flats are also paying the water company, then you are a 'Water Reseller' to the flats.

And yes, that is nothing to do with the letting agent, you have to bill the people that you are reselling water to.
You also have a set of legal responsibilities.

eg. It is ilegal to disconnect a domestic supply for non-payment of bills.
You can't make a profit other than a small admin fee.
You will also have repairing responsibilities for suppy/sewerage up to the boundries of the flats.

See these:
https://www.ofwat.gov.uk/households/...l/waterresale/
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=...HcfnpIYfKxhon3

Your other option would be to arrange for the installation of a seperate supply from the mains to supply the flats - That will cost you plenty of money but once done they will become customers of the Utility Company.

[Linhdieu01]

Hi thank you for your advise but i don't understand the whole resale water idea as i am not the landlord and i don't have the legal rights to install big changes to the building as stated in my lease. i tried to talk to the landlord himself and he doesn't help either. the landlord installed a submeter to the flats but refuse to calculate and bill them instead he expected me to pay the water for the whole building which bring him less hassle.

[nukecad]

By renting the shop with the current setup you have become the 'water supplier' to the flats by circumstances.
If you want to charge the flats for the water they use from your supply then you become a 'water reseller'.

Maybe you should have done more checking before renting the shop.

If you pay the water company for the supply to the whole property (and drainage/sewerage) then you are responsible if that supply (and drainage/sewerage) is further sub-divided to other properties.
The water company is supplying water to you; you are then supplying water to the flats.

Forget the sub-meters in the flats for now, they are nothing to do with the water company.
It doesn't really matter whether those sub-meters are there or not.
They are simply there so that if you do want to charge the tenants of the flats you can easily see what their share should be.

Your choices now are:
You are a water supplier to the flats but you don't have to become a water reseller - you can ignore the sub-division and just pay the whole water/sewerage bill yourself.
If you want to charge the flats for the water (and drainage/sewerage) that they use then you become a water reseller, with all a resellers legal responsibilities.

You could also try to get the Landlord to pay to have the supplies seperated before it gets to the shop, so that the flats then become customers of the water company.
I doubt that is going to happen or he would have done it before.

Just in case you are tempted; one thing that you definitely can't do is simply cut off the water supply to the flats, (except temporarily for emergency repairs). That would almost certainly be illegal.

[Piffy]

Although it is illegal to disconnect a water supply to domestic premises, I would imagine that by reducing it to a trickle would not be illegal. I would send the occupiers of the two properties that you supply to say that on (date) you are having work done to the water supply and it will be off for 8 hours. And when you turn them on its just a trickle. Then re-negotiate their bill paying obligations.

[royw]

Or put in a sub meter to your own part and leave the landlord the problem of paying the bill for the entire premises. It seems the LL won't act unless he gets a bit of grief. We're you aware of this before you signed the contract?

[nukecad]

Piffy,

That sounds very dodgy legally - If you do it intentionally then I would expect at the very least an harassment claim.

[Piffy]

OK but in the time it took for the third parties to get it to court they would have been without water. Its the Landlord who has dropped you in it and made yourself responsible for all the water in the premises.