Water charges legislation... who is the 'customer'?

GUIGuy

I was looking through the legislation for water charges:

http://www.oireachtas.ie/viewdoc.asp?fn=/documents/bills28/acts/2013/a5013.pdf

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Excerpts

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“customer” means, in relation to the provision of water services, the occupier of the premises in respect of which the water services are provided;

“occupier” means, in relation to a premises, the person for the time being entitled to the occupation of the premises;

It shall be presumed, unless the contrary is proved, that the owner of a premises is also the occupier of that premises.

Where a customer fails to pay a charge under this section, it shall be recoverable by Irish Water as a simple contract debt in any court of competent jurisdiction.

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End of excerpts

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This seems a bit vague in relation who is the 'customer'.
Should landlords/tenants declare upfront that they are/are not occupying?
Nothing about unoccupied properties.
No mention of what/when/how one can prove you're not an occupier.
No mention of what register/database will be used by IW to register customers.


It also says that a 'simple contract debt' can be recovered in court.
How is this contract entered into by the customer is not detailed... Do customers volunteer to sign up to the contract or shall a contract be implied without signing if

• Person uses service and is metered (easy to prove service used)
• Person uses service is not metered (difficult to prove service used)
• Unoccupied property and is not metered (no actual usage)

It just seems very vague!
The irish water website is even worse.

http://www.water.ie/billing-and-metering/billing/

Anyone have any information that's clear?

Marcusm

It's defined as the person entitled to occupy. In the absence of a current tenancy agreement, the liability would fall on the owner as (s)he would be entitled to occupy the property. In default of the owner notifying the existence of the tenancy, I imagine the person from whom recovery would be sought would be the registered owner. The only difficulty will arise is in respect of the small number of unregistered (ie neither Land Registry nor Registry of Deeds) properties.

Pro Hoc Vice

It's not vague, it says "It shall be presumed, unless the contrary is proved, that the owner of a premises is also the occupier of that premises."

So there is a rebuttal presumption that the owner of a property is in occupation. There is a presumption again rebutable that water was used and money is due. If a landlord produces a lease then the tennant is the occupier. If no one resides in the property again evidence can be produced of that fact.

The legislation is not drafted for the small number of unoccupied houses,it's drafted to make it as easy for irish water to collect.