Student apartment electric bill given to me for dates I was not moved in yet
Located in Texas
I currently live in a student housing apartment complex. Since this is student housing I pay base rent and only electric every month.
The property manager and electric bill service company are trying to make me pay an electric bill for the unit I moved into for dates that I was NOT in the unit.
My lease says it was supposed to start August 1st however, I did not get keys and move in until August 9th because the previous resident was not out yet and the unit needed to be prepared before I moved in. This is well documented.
On August 23rd I got an email from the electric company stating
"Your utility statement due on 9/1/2023 is ready. A summary of your charges is below, for the account number ending in ... We see that you have not logged in to our site. Before you can access your utility information, please click 'View Statement' ..."
This is normal as I get this email every time I have transferred into a new unit. However I open the bill and it states the bill has been prorated, my move in date was 08/01/23 and the service dates are 8/1/23 - 8/6/23. The service period is 07/07/23 - 08/06/23 and the service address is my new unit.
The bill is huge for those 5 days (maintenance left fans running, A/C blowing constantly etc.) and I did not step foot in to the unit until 08/09/23.
I ask the property manager and electric company and they are stating this bill is from my previous' unit and has been transferred over.
I log into my old electric bill account, it says it has been closed out and the final bill was posted for 08/01/23 (I already paid this) and there is no evidence of any other electric accrual, balance owed, nothing.
The electric company hasn't provided me an invoice or balance for the previous units electric usage and it being transferred over after I asked for something to be shown that this is for my previous unit.
There's information on my old account showing they transferred the unit balance over to my new account on 08/13/23 and it was ZERO DOLLARS.
I even have an email about utilities from the property on 07/06/23 that states.
"ALL Final Utilies for your usage from the dates 6/8/2023 - 7/31/2023 have been posted to your resident portal. Please log into your resident portal to pay your final electric bill and balance."
Now I am just waiting for the property manager to contact me regarding this issue because now she has to speak with someone else at the electric company because the "customer service representative doesn't know anything." and they are both stating this is something the other needs to fix.
I am not going to pay this bill, do I have any leg to stand on if this ends up taking a legal route? I have lots of documentation on my side and they seem to have nothing.
Located in Texas
I currently live in a student housing apartment complex. Since this is student housing I pay base rent and only electric every month.
The property manager and electric bill service company are trying to make me pay an electric bill for the unit I moved into for dates that I was NOT in the unit.
My lease says it was supposed to start August 1st however, I did not get keys and move in until August 9th because the previous resident was not out yet and the unit needed to be prepared before I moved in. This is well documented.
On August 23rd I got an email from the electric company stating
"Your utility statement due on 9/1/2023 is ready. A summary of your charges is below, for the account number ending in ... We see that you have not logged in to our site. Before you can access your utility information, please click 'View Statement' ..."
This is normal as I get this email every time I have transferred into a new unit. However I open the bill and it states the bill has been prorated, my move in date was 08/01/23 and the service dates are 8/1/23 - 8/6/23. The service period is 07/07/23 - 08/06/23 and the service address is my new unit.
The bill is huge for those 5 days (maintenance left fans running, A/C blowing constantly etc.) and I did not step foot in to the unit until 08/09/23.
I ask the property manager and electric company and they are stating this bill is from my previous' unit and has been transferred over.
I log into my old electric bill account, it says it has been closed out and the final bill was posted for 08/01/23 (I already paid this) and there is no evidence of any other electric accrual, balance owed, nothing.
The electric company hasn't provided me an invoice or balance for the previous units electric usage and it being transferred over after I asked for something to be shown that this is for my previous unit.
There's information on my old account showing they transferred the unit balance over to my new account on 08/13/23 and it was ZERO DOLLARS.
I even have an email about utilities from the property on 07/06/23 that states.
"ALL Final Utilies for your usage from the dates 6/8/2023 - 7/31/2023 have been posted to your resident portal. Please log into your resident portal to pay your final electric bill and balance."
Now I am just waiting for the property manager to contact me regarding this issue because now she has to speak with someone else at the electric company because the "customer service representative doesn't know anything." and they are both stating this is something the other needs to fix.
I am not going to pay this bill, do I have any leg to stand on if this ends up taking a legal route? I have lots of documentation on my side and they seem to have nothing.
