justalayman
Senior Member
I do not know the legal requirements of notification involved here but based on the timeline, there possibly was not enough time to notify by mail. While the tenant probably should have followed up with a crrr letter, the timeline made this a moot point.Ohiogal said:Again though HOW did she inform the LL? It is not his fault if she did not inform the LL properly according to the terms of their lease/LL law. And it is realistic to take precautions. The law will want to see that she did everything in her power to prevent the damage. She did not.
This would be the same type of situation as if the electricity had been totally off or if there were an urgent plumbing or building safety issue. While the OP may have been required to notify by mail BUT because of the type of situation, the LL was responsible to respond to the phone call.
Now since I am actually an electrician (yes, you all finally know what this smart a** does for a living), let me say this: the average citizen may very well not realize what was happening and see no reason to unplug anything. The effects are often transient and somewhat undiagnosable without electrical knowledge.
There are situations where the utility company has problems that would produce very similar, if not identical, effects.
Without knowing exactly what was happening, it is impossible to say the OP should have attempted mitigation efforts. The only evidence of a problem I have seen noted here is that the microwave oven was "dragging and dimming". I have had one go bad that sounds like it was doing the same thing. I definately wouldn't have turned off my electricity because of that. So without any other info and knowing that the LL does acknowledge the phone call, I tend to lean to the tenants side here.
to acmb05: if the LL was willing to pay the time (ot if neccessary) I can assure he would have been able to find some electrician to respond that day.
It is basically how serious the LL percieved the situation to be that casued the issue at hand.