How to check the correctness of charges for housing and communal services in the receipt

The use of residential premises owned by citizens under the right of ownership or under social tenancy gives rise to the obligation to pay utility bills in a timely manner and in full. Their composition may vary for certain categories of citizens or types of real estate.

In the material presented, you can learn how to calculate the correctness of housing and communal services accruals, and where you can turn if you identify errors in calculating payments.

Important! If you are looking into your own case related to checking the correctness of the rent calculation, then you should remember that:

Each case is unique and individual.
Understanding the basics of the law is useful, but does not guarantee results.
The possibility of a positive outcome depends on many factors.

What is included in utility bills?

Utility bills will not vary significantly depending on the following factors:

conditions of use of residential premises - property or social rent;
type of residential premises - apartment, private house, etc.;
level of amenities.

The composition of utility payments is determined by the enterprise providing these services to property owners, taking into account the rules established at the federal, regional or local level. In some cases, the composition of utilities will be determined by the homeowners themselves, when they select a management company and conclude an agreement with it for the maintenance of an apartment building.

The list of utilities includes:

payments for water supply and sanitation;
payment for consumed electrical energy;
payments for thermal energy and hot water supply;
payment for the use of liquefied or natural gas;
payment for services for the maintenance of the common property of an apartment building and the surrounding area.

Additional payments not directly related to utility bills include contributions for major home repairs and rent for residential premises.

Important!

As a rule, one organization - a settlement center or management company - will be responsible for charging all utilities. Resource supply organizations enter into agreements with these companies on a reimbursable basis, paying at their own expense a certain percentage for collecting payments.

All charges for utility services are included in the payment document - a receipt. It can be uniform for the payer, or issued in the form of separate forms for each type of utility service.

How to reconcile utility bills

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The entire range of household services, which is aimed at ensuring comfortable living in homes, is provided by specialized housing and communal services organizations.

The relationship between residents of Moscow Railways and utility companies is based on the fulfillment of the terms of contracts, which, according to the Housing Code, are mandatory for conclusion.

One of the obligations of residents, according to Article 153 of the Housing Code, to the housing and communal services service providers is timely payment.

Payments are made by paying off receipts provided by utility companies.

Sometimes situations and controversial issues arise between citizens and representatives of utility companies, the resolution of which can only be achieved after a reconciliation of utility payments has been made.

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How is information about payers generated?

Different regions of the country have their own rules for providing services to the population in the context of the isolation of service providers from each other. This division occurs according to the direction of provision of housing and communal services. Enterprises have their own current accounts and separate balance sheets.

Each resident has a separate personal account, which is opened in all housing and communal services organizations and has a unique set of numbers for their locality. The personal account is filled with information about the consumer. Such data includes:

Full name of the tenant.
The address to which the personal account is assigned.
The total and living area of the home.
Number of persons registered in the apartment.
Tariffing of services.
Monthly accruals and payment dynamics.
Availability of preferential rights.

Based on the order of local authorities, each locality has a unified calculation base, which is compiled on the basis of data transmitted by each municipal office.

The database is synchronized with service providers, and if changes are made to the enterprise’s accounting department, this action will be reflected in the unified database.

At the same time, only employees directly of the organization that provides housing and communal services are authorized to make adjustments to personal accounts.

act of reconciliation of accrued and paid fees for residential premises and utilities

Methods for reconciling utility payments

For the convenience of residents in checking their balance status and obtaining information on their personal account, a unified database has been installed in many government agencies. Therefore, you can check the debt or the presence of overpayment in the following available ways:

when visiting the accounting department of a municipal institution. It should be understood that each organization will be able to perform reconciliation only for its own service. That is, the rent is verified by the housing office, and electricity charges are checked by the power engineers. A nuance in this matter may be the presence of powers in the management company to work with individual utility bills; the availability of such rights can be found directly in the management company;
through the official websites of utilities online. Such a service exists in many organizations. As a rule, this function works in the “Personal Account” section. Each consumer can register on the site and then keep track of their payments and the correctness of charges;
Many leading banks in the country are also equipped with online payment verification services. If such a function is available on the official website of the financial institution, the citizen can only register in a special section of the portal - Internet banking, and carry out the necessary operations without visiting utility offices;
Many settlements are equipped with MFCs. Usually these MFCs are located in the building of the executive committees of the Moscow Region. This is aimed at providing maximum convenience to citizens. The centers are provided with information about the status of personal accounts of all organizations providing housing and communal services. The convenience of reconciliation at the MFC is the absence of queues and speed of service;
It is also possible to carry out reconciliation at post offices endowed with such functions. The inconvenience of choosing this method is the constant presence of queues, which does not make it possible to obtain the information of interest in full.

What to do if inconsistencies are identified in housing and communal services receipts

The need to perform a comparison on a personal account arises if payment receipts are lost or a discrepancy is found in settlements with service providers.

Having received a receipt with incorrect data, you need to check it in any available way.

If, after working on data comparison, your confidence in the untruthfulness of the information written on the receipt has only increased, you should perform the following steps:

Make a written statement addressed to the head of the housing and communal services office who made an error in the receipt. In your appeal you should clarify your disagreements.
Request the issuance of a reconciliation report for the period allowed for consideration in court. That is, over the past three years.
If you do not receive a written response and a reconciliation report within thirty days, you should contact the supervisory authorities with a statement of violation of civil rights.
If an act has been issued and, based on the information specified in it, there is a fact of inflated tariffs or unlawful additional charges, these violations can only be appealed in court.

The need to obtain a reconciliation report lies in the fact that the issued document is confirmation for the court of charges made by public utilities. And if they are truly unlawful, then the court will oblige them to be excluded from the personal account.

Also, if such a disputed amount arises, it will be problematic for utility companies to collect it through the court as a debt, since it is disputed and actions with it are frozen until the correctness of its occurrence is determined. But only if there is correspondence with the utility office.

Since methods of dealing with debtors have recently become more stringent, various methods have been introduced to obtain information about the state of one’s balance on utility bills. Therefore, in case of disagreement with the data specified in the receipt, you can always make an official comparison of the information without postponing this event for a long time.

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What do you need to know for the calculation?

To check the correctness of the rent calculation, you need to know the main indicators that are used for calculation:

total and living area of the apartment;
the number of actually living citizens;
tariff for each type of utility services approved by the authorized body;
standard for calculating resource consumption if meters are not installed in the apartment;
a list of benefits established by authorities for certain categories of citizens.

All of the above indicators must be indicated in receipts that are sent to citizens at the end of the billing month. Information about tariffs, benefits and standards can be found on the official resources of local authorities, as well as in the management company or housing office.

With this information, you can independently calculate the correctness of payments. This task will be much easier if the apartment has officially installed meters for hot and cold water, as well as electricity and gas supply.

How is information about payers generated?

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Full name of the tenant.
The address to which the personal account is assigned.
The total and living area of the home.
Number of persons registered in the apartment.
Tariffing of services.
Monthly accruals and payment dynamics.
Availability of preferential rights.

Based on the order of local authorities, each locality has a unified calculation base, which is compiled on the basis of data transmitted by each municipal office. The database is synchronized with service providers, and if changes are made to the enterprise’s accounting department, this action will be reflected in the unified database. At the same time, only employees directly of the organization that provides housing and communal services are authorized to make adjustments to personal accounts.

How to check if rent is calculated correctly

Checking the correctness of accrued rent amounts will vary depending on the specific type of service:

when paying for consumed electricity, the meter readings are multiplied by the value of one kilowatt;
for hot water supply and thermal energy in the presence of meters - according to the meter indicators multiplied by the approved tariff;
for hot water supply and thermal energy in the absence of meters - according to federal standards, multiplied by the approved tariff;
for cold water supply and sanitation - in a similar manner;
for the consumption of liquefied or natural gas - according to metering devices, multiplied by the tariff.

Important!

In the absence of metering devices, standard indicators are used taking into account the number of residents and the area of living space. In this case, the amount of payments will be much higher than when using meters.

If payments are calculated incorrectly, citizens have the right to apply for recalculation. If payment was made based on erroneous receipts, you can request a refund of the funds paid or their accounting in the following months.

An easy way to check housing and communal services tariffs in receipts

If you receive an unreasonable answer from the management company, then write complaints to the housing inspectorate of your district administration and the prosecutor's office. Let them check the management company to ensure the legality of the housing and communal services tariffs indicated on your receipts.

But in fact, the whole process took me no more than 15 minutes.

Tell me how you can check the legality of the increase in housing and communal services tariffs by the management company? I recently received a receipt for payment of housing and communal services. In it I found increased tariffs compared to housing and communal services tariffs for the previous month. I would very much like to know how to find out the legality of increasing housing and communal services tariffs. Taganrog

There are also numerous websites that combine information about all types of public services. Such a site makes it possible to pay a bill or check whether there is a debt on a particular current account without leaving your computer. To do this, it is enough to know the personal data of the consumer and the current account of the utility company. If a debt is discovered that should not exist, the consumer will be required to contact the utility service to reconcile the payments made. In this case, you must have receipts for the last period of time with you.

Access to the Internet gives its users great opportunities. After all, without leaving the monitor screen you can make various purchases or pay utility bills. At the same time, you can check the payment for a specific service online if you doubt its accrual.

Check payment for housing and communal services at the address

To check payment of utility services, it is not necessary to contact the Housing Office. Any large bank will be able to provide information regarding payments for various utilities. To do this, you need to provide the operator with your personal account number. A personal account is assigned to each consumer of housing and communal services to identify him in the database. Thus, from a personal account it is possible to determine what services a person receives and whether he pays for them in good faith.

The service is convenient because you don’t have to look for consumption standards or established tariffs, they are entered automatically. However, regional calculators do not calculate home maintenance fees and the amount of contributions for major repairs.

Neighbors must establish the procedure for paying for housing and communal services in such an apartment on their own. The agreement must be made in writing and signed by all residents. If owners and tenants fail to agree on the method of calculation, the dispute between them is resolved in court.

In a communal apartment

Quality requirements are described in Appendix No. 1 of the “Rules for the Provision of Utility Services”, approved by PP No. 354 of 05/06/2011. It also establishes the percentages by which payments are reduced in various situations. For example, for each hour that the permissible duration of a break in water or heating supply is exceeded, the cost is reduced by 0.15%.

At the housing office we simply tell the employee the account number and find out the amount to be paid;
Online, through the State Services website. We select one of the many sites by entering the account number in the appropriate column. For example, the most popular resource today is the State Services resource (address ru). We go to the main page, from there we go to the “Accruals” section, and then to “Personal accounts”. All you have to do is specify the code, and it's done.
Payment by personal account through bank websites. For example, Sberbank offers extensive services in this area. On its website you need to register with your phone number and bank card number. But the procedure is a one-time procedure, so in the future you can log in via SMS confirmation on your mobile phone. In the “Payments and Transfers” section there will be a “Housing and Utilities” tab, and by filling out the fields that appear, you will easily and quickly make payments. The system will, of course, generate a receipt, and you can even print it out.

Where to go?

Who controls the correctness of rent calculations, and where can one turn if citizens’ rights are violated? The simplest option would be to contact the housing and communal services company or management company that made the charges directly. In this case, the conflict can be resolved by checking the calculation and making the necessary adjustments.

If the housing and communal services company or officials of the management company refuse to recalculate and insist that they are right, residents can contact the following authorities:

State Housing Inspectorate - on any issues related to the improper provision of utility services and the correctness of calculations;
to the Tariffs and Prices Department - to clarify controversial issues in the process of using individual tariffs;
to the Prosecutor's Office of the Russian Federation - to take response measures in case of violation of the rights and legitimate interests of citizens in the housing and communal services sector.

In addition, if the increase in tariffs is due to the failure to provide a number of utility services, you will need to contact the Rospotrebnadzor service. These institutions will help draw up a report on the inadequate quality of services (for example, low thermal fluid levels).

Contacting the State Housing Inspectorate is the most effective way to achieve a recalculation of payments. When establishing a violation of the rights of citizens in the housing and communal services sector, housing inspection authorities have the right to issue mandatory orders. If three or more orders are not eliminated, the housing and communal services company faces not only a fine, but also revocation of its license.

The prosecutor's office, on the basis of a citizen's application, has the right to conduct an inspection and seize any documentation from a housing and communal services enterprise. If violations are detected, a notice will be issued, which is subject to mandatory execution by officials and housing and communal services enterprises.

What to do if inconsistencies are identified in housing and communal services receipts

The need to perform a comparison on a personal account arises if payment receipts are lost or a discrepancy is found in settlements with service providers. Having received a receipt with incorrect data, you need to check it in any available way. If, after working on data comparison, your confidence in the untruthfulness of the information written on the receipt has only increased, you should perform the following steps:

Make a written statement addressed to the head of the housing and communal services office who made an error in the receipt. In your appeal you should clarify your disagreements.
Request the issuance of a reconciliation report for the period allowed for consideration in court. That is, over the past three years.
If you do not receive a written response and a reconciliation report within thirty days, you should contact the supervisory authorities with a statement of violation of civil rights.
If an act has been issued and, based on the information specified in it, there is a fact of inflated tariffs or unlawful additional charges, these violations can only be appealed in court.

The received utility amount in the utility bill is not always clear or even adequate. Incommensurable amounts are billed for payment. How to understand and check the accrual procedure, who and how to contact for recalculation, further in our article.

Read more: How to check the legality of apartment redevelopment

Instructions on where and how to check payment of utility bills

visit the housing office office;
clarify housing and communal services debt through post offices;
call the management company at the number indicated on the receipt;
clarify data through the websites of service providers;
clarify your personal account data online through portals;
use online banking services.

Live

Housing and communal services - water supply, heating, electricity, gasification and others - are received by the consumer on the basis of an agreement under which he undertakes to pay for them within the time limits determined by municipal authorities at the established tariff.

The first thing the consumer should do is check the receipt itself, since everything is written down on it. The readings indicated in the receipt must be checked with the readings of metering devices located at the entrance of an apartment building or directly in the apartment. Reliable readings are not always provided there.

If it is technically possible to equip an apartment with meters, but the owners have not done so, increasing coefficients until the moment the apartment is equipped with metering devices.

Illegal issuance of receipts for housing and communal services payments - what is the responsibility

After it has been revealed that the receipt is filled out incorrectly and the rent is charged, the citizen has the right to receive explanations from the management organization and if they do not satisfy the consumer, then he has the right to appeal such an unreliable receipt.

To make it easier for the consumer to receive information about the services provided, on the websites of housing and communal inspections and management organizations it is possible to view the correctness of calculations and reconciliation of receipts.

We recommend reading: Practice of Collection of Paid But Not Performed Services

How to challenge incorrect utility billing

Increasingly, disputes regarding utility bills arise due to the unreasonable accrual of amounts for housing and communal services by management companies, the application or use of incorrect tariffs by them, and the application of unreasonable sanctions by them. At the same time, the reason for the accrual of illegal amounts of payments for water, gas, heating, electricity or maintenance of the local area is not always the negligence of housing and communal services employees. Unfortunately, in most cases, employees of utility services and management companies abuse their position and violate the rights of citizens.

Every month the population of the Russian Federation diligently pays bills and services for the provision of gas, electricity, water supply, heating, garbage removal services, major repairs of buildings, and cleaning of local areas. At the same time, the quality of the services provided is not always satisfactory, and rent is still charged at increased rates.

What to do if the rent is calculated incorrectly?

The obligation to timely pay for the above-mentioned services cannot be unilaterally canceled. And if a tenant fails to pay, you can get into trouble in the form of disconnecting the house, entrance, or apartment from unpaid utilities. And yet, how to protect your rights if the user fulfills his obligations, and the service provider evades the proper fulfillment of obligations under the contract or even violates the provisions on the formation of prices for the services provided?

First of all, you need to correctly recalculate payments for services, according to the tariffs in force in your area. To do this, the management company's accounts must be subject to legal review. A disproportionately calculated amount for utilities should be an immediate signal for response, since payment of illegally charged tariffs confirms the tenant’s agreement with its amounts.

To do this, the tenant must contact the Management Company for clarification of the procedure for charging utilities for your home (apartment) and receive a written explanation. Indeed, often at this stage, the settlement center can detect an error made due to negligence and independently recalculate the previously accrued amounts, after which the amounts accrued for payment will correspond to reality and the new accrual procedure will not violate your rights.

If an appeal to the management office did not produce any results, the amounts were not recalculated, or an explanation was not provided, or you were refused any explanation at all, then you should contact a human rights organization that will identify the illegal actions of the management company by sending it a well-drafted claim, and will force the housing office to respond appropriately to the tenant’s appeal.

How does the Management Company respond?

In general, responsibility for the correctness of calculations for utility bills falls on the shoulders of the Management Company, therefore it is obliged to ensure that it excludes the possibility of charging unreasonable payments or making arithmetic errors when calculating the cost of services. In this case, the responsibility of the Management Company is not relieved, even if the Settlement Center is to blame for the incorrect accrual.

Incorrect operation of the payment system, lack of technical capabilities or lack of information about the correct tariffs cannot serve as an excuse for the Management Company.

The management company is obliged, at the first request of the tenant, to check the accuracy of the calculation of payments and, if an error is detected, to immediately correct it and issue the consumer new correct receipts.

All unlawful actions of the Management Company can be appealed by the tenant at any time in an administrative or judicial manner. At the same time, the Management Organization bears full financial responsibility for damage caused to the tenant as a result of unlawful actions on their part, including abuse of authority (disconnection from sources of heat, electricity, water supply, gas or other restrictions).

You can independently check the accuracy of the calculations on receipts if you find out the tariffs that apply to your home. In particular, you can find out about tariffs from the official websites of utility service providers and make calculations based on the amount of services consumed. You can also check information about current tariffs or find out about increases in the cost of housing and communal services on the websites of the local administration or the HOA website.

Having independently calculated the cost of services at current tariffs and independently identified an error, the tenant has the right not to pay the unreasonably accrued amount, paying only the cost of the actual amount of services according to the meter readings in the apartment or house.

At the same time, the tenant has the right to pay the issued utility bills in order to prevent the occurrence of debt, and at the same time contact the Management Company to recalculate the cost of accrued services in the correct amount. In the subsequent month, the tenant will pay a lesser amount for services, taking into account the overpayment.

Also, an overpayment may occur after the Management Company eliminates an accrual error that arose a long time ago and was valid throughout the year. In this case, the tenant may not pay for utilities until the amount of overpayments is compensated by the services provided.

Control and supervisory authorities

In the event of an unreasonable refusal by the Management Company to admit and correct its own mistake, or refusal to recalculate previously paid services at incorrect rates, the tenant has the right to file a complaint with the control and supervisory authorities in the housing and communal services sector, in particular, with the Rospotrebnadzor body and the State Housing Inspectorate.

Rospotrebnadzor considers complaints regarding the failure to provide paid housing services under a contract or the provision of services of inadequate quality, while payment for services was charged in full.

In turn, the State Housing Inspectorate considers complaints regarding the calculation of incorrect tariffs by management companies.

You can file a complaint with the help of a lawyer or contact the above-mentioned authorities, who will tell you how to submit the correct application.

Prosecutor's office

The city or district prosecutor's office ensures that the rights of citizens are respected. If you are sure that the operating organization charges illegal tariffs, shortchanges the residents of the building, and violates the housing rights of citizens, then any resident has the right to send a complaint to the prosecutor’s office with a request to conduct an inspection and respond to the violation when calculating payments for housing and communal services.

In turn, the prosecutor's office will issue an order to the operating organization and oblige it to eliminate the violation within a specified period.

Judicial authorities

Residents whose rights have been violated by the actions of the Management Organizations have the right to file a claim in court at the location of the apartment (house). All disputes regarding housing and communal services are considered by local courts, regardless of the tenant’s appeal to the prosecutor’s office, supervisory and regulatory authorities.

In this case, the tenant must file a claim in court, indicating not only the reasons for the appeal, but also providing evidence of the unlawfulness of the calculations on the part of the Management Organization. The tenant also has the right to demand compensation for material and moral damage caused by deception, incorrect calculations or other unlawful actions of the housing company’s employees. To support the substantiation of his claims to the Managing Organization, the tenant provides a counter-calculation for payment for housing and communal services, which, in his opinion, will be legal.

As a rule, the courts establish all the circumstances of the case, request real information, check the accuracy of accrued payments, take measures against violators of the tenant’s rights, in particular, oblige to restore the supply of electricity, gas, water and other mandatory services.

In particular, if the court establishes the criminal intent of the Management Organization, it will bring the defendant to administrative responsibility or transfer the case materials to the Prosecutor's Office to initiate criminal proceedings.

Fine for the Managing Organization

Article 157 of the Housing Code of the Russian Federation provides for liability in the event of the provision of low-quality utility services or the use of incorrect calculations of the cost of housing and communal services.

According to the requirements of the Federal Law on the Protection of Consumer Rights, the tenant has the right to demand the elimination of violations, correct recalculation, compensation for losses, and payment of a penalty in the amount of 1% of the wrongfully accrued amount of payments. In addition, the tenant has the right to demand payment of a fine in the amount of 50% of the amount of the claim for refusal to voluntarily eliminate violations on the part of the Management Company.

Execution of a court decision

The amount won in court will be used to pay future payments, so the Management Company will, at its own expense, pay for the services provided to you until the amount of the fine assessed by the court is fully repaid.

In order for the Management Company to voluntarily comply with a court decision to compensate the tenant for the cost of paid services and pay the amount of the fine, the tenant must submit an application to the Management Company. If the management company does not comply with the court’s requirement, the tenant has the right to contact the FSSP authorities and force the company to comply with the court’s decision. In this case, the Criminal Code will pay the costs of executing the court decision to the FSSP authorities.

How our lawyers can help

Our law firm will help you resolve the issue related to the calculation of incorrect housing and communal services tariffs and the violation of your rights by the Management Organization. Professionally and quickly, our lawyers will prepare an application, claim, complaint or statement of claim to various regulatory organizations or the court, represent your interests in court, help enforce the court decision and bring the violator to justice as much as possible. Our housing and communal services specialists will make the correct calculation of utility bills for you, prepare a counter-calculation for the court, and apply to the Prosecutor's Office and control and supervisory authorities to protect your rights. Contact us to file a claim or receive competent legal advice.

The legislative framework

To calculate the costs of housing and communal services, knowledge of the norms of both federal and regional legislation is required.

Fundamental rules regarding the determination of the amount of housing payments are contained in Articles 156–157 of the Housing Code of the Russian Federation.

These articles establish the principles for determining and the procedure for calculating the amount of fees for the use of residential premises, fees for the maintenance and repair of residential premises, as well as the amount of fees for utilities, as well as:

The amount of funds contributed by residents for the maintenance of apartment buildings should allow maintaining the proper condition of common property;
Arbitrary increase in tariffs is not allowed;
Subsidies may be provided for citizens' expenses for housing and communal services..

Housing legislation imposes an obligation on the owners and users of residential real estate to finance the maintenance of an apartment building (MCD) and the common property located on its territory.

It is necessary to jointly pay for the resources used for these purposes (water, electricity), and apartment owners and tenants must compensate for the individual use of housing and communal services.

Persons who own apartments in apartment buildings are required to invest funds for major repairs of the house, and citizens living in the premises on the basis of a social tenancy agreement make payments for rental housing to the budget of the relevant municipality.

The size of this contribution depends on the quality characteristics of the housing provided for use.

The detailed procedure for calculating rent is contained in Government Resolution No. 354 of May 6, 2020.

This document establishes the rules for providing utility services to residents of apartment buildings and specifies the procedure for:

Charges for utilities both for apartments equipped with meters and without them;
Recalculation of fees for certain types of utility services;
Changes in payment amounts.

You may be interested in the article on how to find out rent arrears via the Internet - by address, by personal account, you can read about it here.