Legislative regulation
Is it legal to cut off electricity for non-payment?
To become familiar with the legal aspects of this issue, you can refer to the following legislative acts :
- Decree of the Government of the Russian Federation No. 354 of May 6, 2011 and its version, which came into force on December 26, 2016, “On the provision of utility services to owners and users of premises in apartment buildings and residential buildings.”
- Decree of the Government of the Russian Federation No. 442 dated 05/04/2012 and its edition dated 02/04/2017 “On ... complete and (or) partial limitation of the mode of consumption of electrical energy...”.
It should also be taken into account that deprivation of the opportunity to use electricity can be both legal and illegal.
Let's consider cases when this measure against a defaulter is permissible :
- Power outage to the owner of the apartment, or to the tenant to whom the apartment is provided under social security conditions. hiring , permissible. But to do this, you will first need to notify the debtor in accordance with the rules.
- If the situation concerns legal entities , the electricity supplier will also need to notify the debtor, after which the power supply can be turned off.
illegal to cut off the supply of electricity in the following situations:
- If , a gardening non-profit partnership, does not pay In some cases, SNT itself tries to turn off the light to the defaulter, which is contrary to the law. As a result, this participant may sue the partnership.
- It will also be unlawful to turn off electricity if the owner of the apartment or house was not notified in advance in accordance with the instructions.
- It is not legal to disconnect from the power grid if only housing and communal services have not been paid for . The power supply can be stopped only if the electricity bills are not paid.
How to calculate ODN for electricity according to the established standard? Find out from our article.
conclusions
During the holidays, when people leave home for a long time, make sure that they pay utility bills on time.
- If one of the owners has a debt for utilities. Remember that you can suspend or limit the supply of a resource.
- It is possible to restrict any public services if there is a reason for the restriction and a technical possibility.
- All services can be suspended, but heating and cold water supply cannot be suspended.
- Specify in the contract for the provision of utility services to what extent and according to what schedule you can limit the utility service for the debt.
- Inform the debtor that you have decided to limit some utility service to him.
- Do not inform the debtor about the restriction or suspension of the debt settlement if at least one condition from clause 115 of Rules No. 354 applies.
- The costs of limiting, suspending and renewing the debt are paid by the debtor. Only after he has paid the debt and reimbursed expenses can you resume providing him with CG.
Reasons and amount of debt
The reasons for the outage can be very different, and you always need to understand why the electricity was turned off at a particular moment. The main reasons why the light supply may stop are:
- illegal connection to the power grid;
- refusal to pay for services;
- if the equipment used in the house does not comply with safety regulations;
- scheduled maintenance. They are notified in advance. Shutdowns can last no more than 24 hours at a time. And in a year there should be a total of no more than 3 days.
At the same time, electricity suppliers do not immediately fight debtors by turning off electricity.
First, the defaulter receives a warning .
This occurs after payment for 2 months . We will consider the procedure for receiving notifications and power outages below.
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Changing the procedure for restricting and suspending public services
The utility service provider has the right to provide for a different procedure for limiting and suspending utility services.
This possibility is enshrined in clause 119 of Rule 354, according to which, unless otherwise established by federal laws, decrees of the President of the Russian Federation, decrees of the Government of the Russian Federation or an agreement containing provisions on the provision of utility services, the contractor, in the event of incomplete payment by the consumer for utility services, has the right after a written warning (notification ) consumer-debtor to limit or suspend the provision of such utility services.
From the contents of paragraphs. “p” of clause 19 of Rule 354 follows that the conditions on the grounds and procedure for suspending and limiting the provision of utility services are essential in the agreement on the provision of utility services.
Therefore, both the management organization in the management agreement and the HOA or other housing association in the agreement on the provision of utility services can change the procedure for limiting utility services.
Procedure
As stated above, if payment of electricity bills has not been made within 2 months , then the defaulter will be notified. The document states:
- consumer - an individual or legal entity, the address to which electricity was supplied. The power outage will occur at this address.
- Reason for disconnection . For example, non-payment. In this case, you will need to indicate the amount of debt.
- Level of restrictions on the use of electricity, timing of shutdowns. Moreover, de-energizing the living space occurs no earlier than 10 days after receiving the notification, it is prohibited. At the moment, 20 days are allotted from the date of receipt of the document.
- Signature.
The main condition at the moment is to record data about the fact of transmission of the notification and the date of receipt of the document.
One option involves delivery in person, with the recipient signing for receipt.
Postal delivery is also possible, but in the form of a registered letter.
Ignoring the first notice results in a second notice being sent to the debtor, which is provided within 3 days and notifies of the limitation or complete cessation of the supply of electricity.
If the debtor continues to evade payment, then a restriction on the use of electricity is first introduced. And immediately an additional 10 days are given to pay the debt. If the debts are not paid within this period, the company completely stops providing the service.
If there was no notification at all, then turning off the electricity will be illegal. The service user will be able to fully sue the company responsible for supplying electricity to court , and also demand moral compensation.
Form for notification of power outage for non-payment.
How to work with debtors
Inform the debtor that you have decided to limit some utility service to him. You can do this in several ways:
- hand over the notice against signature,
- send a registered letter,
- print a warning on the payment document,
- call and record a telephone conversation,
- notify by email,
- write an SMS message.
There is no need to notify the consumer in advance about the limitation or suspension of utility services if (clause 115 of Rules No. 354):
- emergency situation in utility networks;
- natural disasters or emergency situations;
- detection of unauthorized connection of the consumer’s intra-apartment equipment to in-house engineering systems;
- the consumer's use of household machines whose connection power exceeds the maximum permissible load;
- receipt by the executor of an order on the need to introduce a restriction or suspension of the Civil Code.
After receiving the warning, the consumer has 20 days to repay the debt. If he does not do this, you have every right to limit the provision of utilities.
In premises and households where it is technically impossible to limit CG, 10 days after the introduction of the restriction, consumers will temporarily stop receiving CG if they have not paid the full amount by that time.
The costs of limiting, suspending and renewing the debt are paid by the debtor. After he pays the debt and reimburses the expenses, you can resume providing him with utility services.
These measures do not apply to debtors who have entered into an agreement with the executor to repay the debt.
Do management companies need to pay excess ODN?
What should I do to get the light back?
What should I do to get the light turned on again? The easiest and most effective way is to pay your outstanding electricity bills.
The power supply will be restored within 2 days from the date of payment.
It is possible that the management company will require payment for a reverse connection ; the cost will be clarified by an employee of the electricity supply company. After paying for all services, electricity will return to the house again.
sample application to the management company from the owner of the residential premises.
Contents of the notice
Russian legislation does not establish an official sample of notification of arrears in payment of utility services. There is a free format for writing the document, but you still need to adhere to a business style. Threats, slander and insults against the debtor are not allowed in the text. The language in which the notice is written should be simple and understandable; you should not use ambiguous phrases, slang or obscene words. The content of the document should be concise, clear and to the point.
The recipient must pay attention to the period of consumption indicated in the notification and the correctness of the accrual of penalties. It is worth keeping in mind that a penalty accrued for the first month of late payment is considered illegal.
The notice of repayment of utility debts must include the following information :
- Details of the utility company;
- Personal data of the debtor;
- Information about the residential premises at the address of which the debt was generated;
- Amount of debt;
- The period during which the debt was formed;
- Payment period;
- Information about penalties, fines, restrictions, disconnection of the supplied service, appeal to the courts or other methods of collecting debt.
The method of presenting the warning to the debtor also plays an important role. It is quite possible that in the courtroom you will need to provide evidence of compliance with the procedure established by law, according to which the owner of the apartment must be properly informed about his debt and the timing of its repayment.
Notification can be sent in the following ways :
- Sent by registered mail with acknowledgment of receipt;
- Personal delivery against signature indicating the date of receipt;
- Courier delivery against signature on a special form;
- Sending with the help of a notarized representative.
Sep 10, 2019adminlawsexp
The procedure for suspending or limiting public services
1. Indicate a convenient way for you to notify owners about the upcoming shutdown.
Moreover, do not limit yourself to one method, indicate all possible methods of notification and provide that notification is made by the contractor in one of the specified methods at the choice of the contractor.
When you prescribe several methods of notification in the contract, do not forget to prepare the ground for their implementation. For example, you indicated that you can notify the owner by email. In this case, it is necessary that the email address be indicated by the owner in the details.
2. Add a condition that the owner bears the risk of not receiving notifications and other incoming correspondence.
You sent a notification to the debtor by mail, he did not receive it, but the track number shows that the letter has been waiting for him for two weeks. We advise you to consider suspending utility services upon expiration of the letter's retention period.
3. If the premises are owned by several persons (joint ownership or shared ownership), stipulate in the contract the obligation of the co-owner who received the notification to notify other co-owners.
We recommend including conditions for suspending utility services or separating them into a separate section “Procedure for suspending utility services.”
How to set the price of a management contract for an apartment building
Notice of Water Shutdown for Non-Payment Sample
c) general information about apartment buildings managed by a management organization, partnership and cooperative, including characteristics of the apartment building (including the address of the apartment building, year of construction, number of floors, number of apartments, area of residential and non-residential premises and premises included in the common property in an apartment building, level of improvement, series and type of construction, cadastral number (if available), area of land included in the common property in an apartment building, design and technical parameters of an apartment building), as well as information on engineering systems security included in the common property in an apartment building;
Clause 3 of the specified document clearly states that “ delivery of a postal item, notification of delivery and notification is a production operation consisting of moving a postal item, notification of delivery, notice of a registered postal item from the postal facility of the destination to the cell of the subscriber's mailbox
, to the addressee's mailbox or at the specified address, through the mailboxes of strongholds for delivery
».
Notification of debt on utility bills
According to the court's decision, in addition to the debt, you will be charged the costs of HOA Lenin 20 for paying the state fee, the costs of legal representation in court and other legal costs; moreover, for late payment, you will be additionally charged a penalty.
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Is it possible to shut off utilities for non-payment in 2020?
The payer has time to settle the issued receipt. Whether it is possible to delay the payment of funds for consumed services and for how long is established by law. They provide for a deadline for payment for consumed housing and communal services resources as the 31st day of the month in which the receipt was delivered to the payer.
Sometimes management companies (MCs) use such illegal measures as posting lists of debtors on entrance doors, publishing them in the media, or not issuing certificates of family composition to debtors. You may be faced with the impossibility of registering/checking out of your living space if you have debts for housing and communal services.
Disconnection from water and sewer networks
If an emergency occurs on water and sewer networks, the subscriber must inform the dispatcher of OJSC "DVK" about the accident by telephone message (tel.) and no later than one business day following the day of the call, fill out an Application - a letter of guarantee and make payment for the services provided.
- the subscriber exceeding by three times or more the standards for permissible discharges of pollutants, other substances and microorganisms or limits on discharges of pollutants, other substances and microorganisms, committed two times or more within one year from the date of the first excess (hereinafter referred to as repeated gross violation of standards permissible discharges or discharge limits);
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New law on utility debtors
The maximum delay in payment for utilities can be 31 days. Previously, penalties were accrued for a month of delay; now penalties are accrued for 31 days of failure to make payments. To use installment plans and deferments, valid reasons for delaying payment are required. These include:
Every year utility tariffs increase. 2020 was no exception for citizens of the Russian Federation. At the beginning of last year, a new law was adopted to tighten liability for debtors in payment for housing and communal services. What the new law implies and what punishment is provided for willful defaulters, we will consider further in the article.
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