Reasons A Utility Company Would Contact Landlord

[Orygun]

Hello IC,

I've searched around the forums and I'm having problems finding an answer to this question.

Can/Will a utility company inform the landlord of a significant increase in power consumption over the last tenants? Or is this something that happens when a bill is delinquent?

I ask because this just happened to a friend of mine but I'm not sure if he was late on his bill. He said his utility company called his landlord and told him that his electricity use has increase fourfold over the last tenants and his water use increased sevenfold, so was this due to late payment or probably just the power spike over the last tenant?

Any information on the general subject of a landlords relationship with utility companies would be very helpful.

Thanks so much fellas
-Orygun

 

[indickahead]

never heard of that happening before...

 

[dtfsux]

whose name is the bill in? If in the tenants name, that is fucked up and can not believe they can do that. That is like a privacy issue. That is also alot of work to find the landlord

If the bill is in the landlords name then it would not be odd because they are probably asking for a larger deposit

 

[fishheadbob]

I'm thinking the LL figured it out on his own that your pal was growing. Rather than confront him directly about it, hde put the blame on the power co.

 

[mrpotatohead]

I'm thinking the LL figured it out on his own that your pal was growing. Rather than confront him directly about it, hde put the blame on the power co.

That's exactly what I was thinking. Contacting the landlord seems highly unlikely.

K