Paying bills after you've left

Need some advice here. Left a house in January, paid up all my bills and gave them the money they wanted towards bills which would be due soon, which I thought was more than fair enough. I've now moved abroad and obviously due to the cost of flights, deposits and whatnot, I'm seriously broke. Got a text off one of the old flatmates asking me for a large amount towards the winter bills. What really annoyed me was they're claiming that I was in the house more than they were - that's BS in my opinion. They said I stayed in the house most weekends - not true. Yeah, I rarely went HOME, but I stayed at my BF's all weekend more often than not, and I worked until 10-11pm every night so never got the use out of the heating being on, never once got to watch TV, etc. I was barely there, and they knew that and commented on it at the time! Not to mention I wasn't even in the house for 2 weeks at Christmas, I was at my parents!

What should I do? I'm thinking just not reply, but I'm very angry about this 'you were there more' attitude, when if anything it's quite the opposite. And to be honest, even if I HAD been there more, surely it's not my problem if they decided to go home every weekend? You can't split bills by arguing about who spent more time in the place. What about all the evenings they had the heating and TV on all night while I was at work? That's conveniently forgotten about!

petes

In my view bills aren't paid by the amount of time you are in the house. Split equally between whoever is in the house when the bills come in. Did you leave enough when you left? Get a copy of each bill, work out what you paid and pay the rest if you can.


None of this nonsence about you being in the house more!!

cooperla

Unless you all had IDs cards for clocking into and out of the house and for using the different appliances then tell them no.

I was going to write more but there's no point - just tell them to p*** off.

radioactiveman

Yeah +1,
I was once charged bills coming into the house, the day I arrived for a period before I was living there. Then after I left, the landlord met me and demanded money for a bill that came after I had gone. I had a good relationship with the landlord and paid it but if it was to happen again I'd tell him to F off.

Tell them to get lost, especially if you already settled for future bills before you left.

andrewdeerpark

I know this is advice after the fact however the only variable bills you would have are ESB, Gas or landline telephone.

If you took a reading from the ESB and or GAS metre the day you left and do the maths that's that sorted.

At this stage forget them...

country_gurl

2 words to tell them piss off and neway if they want the money tell them to come get...
Bills are split right down the middle not on whose used what etc.

axer

Just txt back that that is a rubbish argument and there is no way you are paying that. Include that is the end of the story and don't respond to them any more after that. They had as much right to be in the house as much as they wanted. If they didnt want to be there or were somewhere else that is their problem unless they had some prior agreement which they obviously didnt. They cannot do anything about this either - its not like they could bring you to court over it and they are completely wrong.

seamus

Yeah, it's all bull.

Assuming that you have no need to even speak to these people again (i.e. they're not mates), I'd be tempted to just ignore it.

It may be that the bills were way larger than they expected and your contribution was slightly less than theirs and so they are looking to blame it on someone. If you want to be reasonable, maybe text them saying that ,"I've paid my fair share, but if the bills were way larger than we thought they'd be, email me a photocopy of the bills and I'll pay the rest of my equal share".

You probably won't hear from them again.

I don't know whether they want me to pay MORE than they paid or the same, but the fact they had to mention that 'I was there more' pissed me off. It's not as if I did a runner. I found someone for my room, paid up all my bills and gave them money towards future bills. If it had been too much money and the bill was lower than they expected, would they have come to me offering a refund? Think not! The last set of bills I paid covered a period when I wasn't living there, so I have no idea why the new guy can't pay his share of this one.

The_Conductor

Gas and electricity prices both increased 20% last September. This only really becomes noticeable over the winter period when costs can be 5 or 6 times what they might be in other periods. If you have a look in this forum you'll find people who have gotten totally ridiculous gas and electricity bills in the past few days (myself included). My gas bill which came in last week is over twice as high as the last highest bill ever got (the previous winter). It wouldn't be surprising to get caught out with massive bills at this time of the year.