Before
you rent we suggest that you…
Contact our Customer
Service Centre to
Register as a landlord.
This only takes a few moments over the phone and all we need is
your name, your mailing address, and a list of your rented properties.
We will let you know when your tenant is 30 days behind in his or
her payment.
Find out if prospective
tenants have a good history of paying their water bills.
You will need written permission from your tenant for us to release
this information.
Find out about the
water meters and service connections at each of your rental units. In some
cases, one meter supplies water to several residences or businesses. Other
times, one service connection serves several residences or businesses,
with separate meters in each unit. In neither of these cases do we turn
off the water from a customer who is not paying the bills. Outstanding
balances are added to the property owner’s tax bill.
Consider
setting up accounts for your rental property in your name rather than your
tenant’s name. Then you will know how much water your tenant is
consuming. You can pay the bills yourself and adjust the rent to include
the water and sewage.
As a landlord, the choice
is yours. Make sure that you
record in the Tenancy Agreement any arrangements that you make with your
tenants about payment of their water and sewer bill.
In the Agreement, remind tenants that they must phone in four meter
readings each year. We will mail
them the meter-reading cards every three months.
Once a year, beginning late
spring, our workers read the meters as well.
Regular readings can save money by preventing estimated bills and by
alerting you or your tenant to costly plumbing leaks.
Check taps and toilets regularly for leaks. Even small leaks can cost
you or your tenants hundreds of dollars in unnecessary water and sewer
charges.
90%
of all household water leaks are in the toilet.
A silent leak in the toilet can waste more than 400 litres of water a
day. To check for leaks, drop a
little food colouring in the tank. Do
not flush. Wait for about 15
minutes. If the food colouring
appears in the toilet bowl, your toilet has a silent leak.
You will likely find it in or around the flapper valve at the bottom of
the tank.
Install water conservation
devices, such as low-flow showerheads, low-flow faucet aerators and
early-closure toilet flappers. These
items are low-cost and easy to install, and will save you money for years to
come. Ask your tenants to
tell you right away if they notice any leaks, such as a dripping tap or a
toilet that runs continuously. Contact
the Province of Manitoba, Employment and Income Assistance Office if you are
planning to rent to an individual receiving social assistance – they may be
able to pay the bill directly. See
the telephone listing under Government of Manitoba, Family Services &
Housing, near the end of the White Pages of your MTS phone book.
During
tenancy we suggest that you…
Contact us on the day a
new tenant signs a Tenancy Agreement to make sure that the account is set
up in the appropriate name. If
the new tenant is to be the account holder, please make sure that we have
all the information we need. Also,
send us a first meter reading on the day your new tenant moves in.
If we don’t have this information, we will not be able provide
water service.
Contact us from time to
time to find out whether your tenants are paying their water bills and
phoning in regular water meter readings.
Phoning in regular water meter readings can save money since an
accurate bill may alert you to a water leak.
Otherwise, an undetected leak can cost you or your tenant hundreds
or even thousands of dollars in water or sewer charges.
Make sure that your
tenants are paying bills based on actual consumption, not estimated
readings. This is important.
If under-billing is occurring due to estimated bills, final bills
can be much higher than expected. You
will have to pay if your tenants do not pay their final water and sewer
bill.
The
Province of Manitoba Residential Tenancies Branch provides information on the
rights and responsibilities of landlords and tenants.
It helps find solutions to residential tenancy problems through
information, mediation, investigation and adjudication. For a copy of their
Policies and Procedures Guidebook, or for more information, visit their Web
Site at www.gov.mb.ca/cca/residtb.html
or contact the agency at: 945-2476,
or toll free at 1-800-782-8403 E-mail at rtb@cca.gov.mb.ca
When
a tenant is vacating your premises we suggest that you…
Check with us when your
tenants tell you that they are moving to see if they have been providing
regular meter readings. If
not, get one and call us. We
will then bill them for actual, not estimated consumption.
This will avoid a high final bill as a result of a series of
estimated bills.
Call us with a final
meter reading on the day the tenants leave so that we can promptly issue a
final bill for water and sewer service.
We can tell you the final bill amount so that you can withhold the
security deposit until the bill is paid.
We find it hard to collect the final bill, if we do not have the
tenants‘ new address. We
add unpaid final bills to property taxes.
Give us any new
information on the departing tenants, such as a new address or phone
number, or a new employer. This will help us collect any outstanding water
and sewer charges.
Give us the name of the
new account holder for your property. If a property is to remain vacant
for a time, you must still register the name of an account holder. If we
do not know the account holder for any property, e turn off the water
service. (For
example: If a tenant leaves on November 15, and the new tenant won’t
take possession until January 1, you must give us the name of an account
holder for the period November 15 - January 1, and then the name of the
new account holder, effective January 1.
Before
selling or purchasing . . .
To protect yourself from
costly surprises, before you buy or sell any type of housing or commercial
unit, we suggest that…
When selling property,
call us with a meter reading to make sure that you are billed correctly at
the time of the sale. Do
this, even if your tenant is responsible for the water bill and plans to
rent from the new owner. If
we receive a reading months later, we pro-rate the bill between the former
owner and the new owner. If
the new owner rents to new tenants that use lots of water, you may end up
with a higher bill than you expected.
When
purchasing property, don’t finalize the sale until the vendor provides a
meter reading and their lawyer pays the final water bill.
Don’t rely on the vendor to do this.
Tell your lawyer to make sure that the final actual water bill is
paid before you sign to finalize the purchase.
Remember, we add unpaid bills to the property taxes.
Meter
readings can be phoned in to 986-3212, 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
Or, call our Customer Service Centre, weekdays, 8:30 am to 4:30 pm,
except statutory holidays.
Collection
Procedures Effective December 1, 2000
When
we receive applications for new water accounts, our staff will ask
specifically if the applicant is an owner or tenant.
If tenants, we ask for the following additional information which will
help us locate them if they don’t pay their water and sewer bill:
Name, address and phone
number of applicant’s employer, and their spouse’s employer (or case
worker where applicable), Driver’s license and vehicle license number.
Previous water account
address.
Name, address, and
phone number of an alternate contact.
Each time a tenant’s
account has an outstanding balance of
$25 or more and
we have not received payment within
30 days of the billing date, we can, if
asked, inform the tenant that we will
turn off the water unless we receive full payment within 15 days.
For this to happen, the
landlord…
Must have checked with
us and found out that the account had not been paid.
Must ask us, in writing, to send a letter of warning to the tenant.
We will turn off the water
to accounts with outstanding balances of $100 or more when we have not
received payment within 60 days of the billing date, unless…
The tenant arranges to
pay off the outstanding balance in regular installments.
Before we can agree to this, we must have the landlord’s written
consent, or,
the tenant has an excellent credit
history with us.
We will not turn off the
water service if…
The water utility bill
is in the owner’s name.
One meter supplies
water to several residences or businesses.
One service connection
serves multiple residences or businesses.
However, in these cases,
when payment has not been received within 60 days of the billing date, we will
add outstanding balances of $100 or more to the property owner’s tax bill.
If the tenants vacate rental units with an outstanding final bill of
$100 or more and we have not received payment within 60 days of the billing
date, we will add the outstanding amount to the property taxes.
First, however, we will try
to recover the money from the tenant. We
will send the tenant’s final bill to a forwarding address (if we have the
information) or the address on file (if we do not have the information).
At the same time, we will notify the landlord registered with our
Department, of the tenant’s outstanding balance.
If payment is not made by the deadline (60 days from the billing date),
we will add the amount owing to the property tax bill.
If the tenant has not made
payment after 45 days from the final billing date, we will send a second
letter to the registered landlord advising them that the deadline is
approaching. This gives them an
opportunity to pay the bill themselves and prevent charges from being added to
the rental unit’s property tax bill, which may in turn affect their Tax
Installment Payment Plan (TIPP) payments.
We send accounts with a
final outstanding balance of $50 or more to a private collection agency.
By the time we receive the money, the landlord may have already paid
the bill or we may have already added the outstanding amount to the property
taxes. In that case, we return
the money to the landlord, or credit the amount to the owner’s property
taxes and we pay the collection agency fee.
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For more information
from the City of Winnipeg, Water and Waste Department, please contact the
Customer Service Department at 986-5858.