Reply To: Excessive service charge in Specified Accommodation
I have exactly the same issue- a landlord has increased their communal heat and light charges up from last year by 292%
The eligible communal heat and light charges were only £15,000 last year (block of 35 rooms) and are now shown to be over £62,000 but the tenants ineligible share last year was £12,000 and has only increased to just over £14,000 so completely disproportionate.
I re-valued the charges and re-apportioned them back to the ineligible but the landlord is asking for me to re-consider saying that they subsidise and absorbed the tenants ineligible share through their own centralised revenue stream and saying the 292% increase in communal is correct and all eligible for HB- On that logic if I add 292% to the ineligible share they must be subsiding around 36k as I worked out then the energy cost would be around £112k up from 28K previous year. I have asked for evidence of their energy bill because of the increase- we have another huge accommodation block with 55 flats where the utility charges are 25K for their communal areas so this seems very excessive – just wondered if you stuck to your decision to restrict the communal charges and re-apportion them back as ineligible as it clearly looks like from what you described that some of the tenants ineligible share has been moved into the communal charges- if anyone else has any thoughts on this please share
