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National Water & Power ripoff trumped up, irrelevant and unexplained billing Company is nothing but a self created and useless entity! Dallas Texas
I was told by my apartment complex, per my rental agreement, I had to pay National Water & Power (NW&P), a utility management and billing company for allocated water service, sewer, trash and that based on only 2 tenants in my building my bill would run $20 per month.
My bill has done nothing but gone up every month ($40 this month), contrary to what the leasing agent assured at the time of lease signing. There is a "service fee" and an "expedited payment fee" attached to each bill. I pay my bill online each month am required also to pay an additional "convenience fee". These meritless fees are ridiculous and require no explanation by this company. They are not even clever while fluffing the bills of who knows how many victims to take monies not even earned!
The bill does not come in the same time each month. The billing cycle is totally random, which probably helps them to extort a late fee from anyone who need to work with a routine billing cycle like the rest of billing world. NW&P say they bill when the utility bills them, saying they receive there information radomly, but funny how that, in addition, to everything else is completely unverifiable.
The description portion of the bill is BLANK, meaning there is no description of your water, sewer and trash fees are assessed, which fluctuates, always increasing.
I must pay this bill or be evicted from my apartment home. I called NW&P, to get an explanation of my bill, but everything was confidential! We can't tell you how we came to these numbers without the permission of your complex to do so, but expect payment without explanation. What I did find out is:
The Apartment Complex is supposed to take a percentage of the bill (this also was confidential) and pay it themselves towards lawn maintanance and pools. The rest is billed per building, not individual usage, and then divided among the units in that building. Do I pay for service in the empty units, too? What is my building useage? I am sorry, but that information is confidential. Everything pertaining to the bill and how it is billed, except for the Net Amount Due is confidential!
Can you imagine paying your power bill and the power company telling you that you must pay the bill without question becuase the watts used and the price per watt is confidential!?! Ridiculous!
My only recourse would be for the apartments to provide me the information or to allow NW&P to give me the information. There are over 1,000 units in my complex. I don't see how I could possibly handle that kind search and find mission every month, assuming I would even be given the information by either entity.
This company is nothing but a self created and useless entity, acting as a middle man between the apartment complex and the actual utility company that serves no other purpose than to make money by ripping of the tenants who cannot get anwers to any legitimate billing questions any other normal utility statment would provide.
I am very tempted to move when my lease is up because I am so disgusted with the allowance of this company's ridiculous practices.
Jenee
Phoenix, Arizona
U.S.A.
6 Updates & Rebuttals
Chris
Carmichael,California,
U.S.A.
Justice In Carmichael, CA.
#7Consumer Suggestion
Sat, April 01, 2006
Stand up and fight for your rights!
I got an attorney and I am getting a complete refund of every dime I paid for NW&P! They ripped me off and now are forced to return my money to me. This is illegal and if you don't stand up for your rights then shame on you for allowing this to happen to you! Your property management company is using NW&P as a way to collect more than rent from you. Allot of double talk and hiding truths to keep you in the dark about what is going on.
Chris
Carmichael,California,
U.S.A.
Justice In Carmichael, CA.
#7Consumer Suggestion
Sat, April 01, 2006
Stand up and fight for your rights!
I got an attorney and I am getting a complete refund of every dime I paid for NW&P! They ripped me off and now are forced to return my money to me. This is illegal and if you don't stand up for your rights then shame on you for allowing this to happen to you! Your property management company is using NW&P as a way to collect more than rent from you. Allot of double talk and hiding truths to keep you in the dark about what is going on.
Chris
Carmichael,California,
U.S.A.
Justice In Carmichael, CA.
#7Consumer Suggestion
Sat, April 01, 2006
Stand up and fight for your rights!
I got an attorney and I am getting a complete refund of every dime I paid for NW&P! They ripped me off and now are forced to return my money to me. This is illegal and if you don't stand up for your rights then shame on you for allowing this to happen to you! Your property management company is using NW&P as a way to collect more than rent from you. Allot of double talk and hiding truths to keep you in the dark about what is going on.
Chris
Carmichael,California,
U.S.A.
Justice In Carmichael, CA.
#7Consumer Suggestion
Sat, April 01, 2006
Stand up and fight for your rights!
I got an attorney and I am getting a complete refund of every dime I paid for NW&P! They ripped me off and now are forced to return my money to me. This is illegal and if you don't stand up for your rights then shame on you for allowing this to happen to you! Your property management company is using NW&P as a way to collect more than rent from you. Allot of double talk and hiding truths to keep you in the dark about what is going on.
Chris
Carmichael,California,
U.S.A.
NW&P & Property Management Are A Rip Off Team!
#7Consumer Suggestion
Tue, February 14, 2006
Don't let NW&P along with Your Property Management Company give you a bunch of double talk. This is a way for them to TAKE money from you. You need to talk to other residents and join together to get NW&P out of buisness.
Call your local Board of Supervisiors, TV station in your area that have a consumer hotline, call fair housing. Last but not least find an attorney that will help you and all of the other residents that have been taken advantage of. Get your money refunded!!!!!
They are STEALING from you and you are paying a processing fee for them to rip you off!
Don't just sit there and believe what you are being told! It doesn't make sence, so use your own better judgement and take back what is yours!!!!!Trust yourself!!!
Jenee
Phoenix,Arizona,
U.S.A.
Finally.. some resolution
#7Author of original report
Wed, February 11, 2004
I was exasperated trying to get some answers from either my apartment complex or the billing company. I ended up writing National Water & Power and copied it to my apartment complex that I would pay the only the amount of bill I understood until someone gave me a reasonable explanation of how the billing works and what I am paying for. So for the next couple of months I short paid my bill, however, paid what I thought seemed fair. I did finally get a call from a NW&P representative who was very informative as to how the billing is handled. To my understanding, it seems that NW&P only bills the way the apartment complex instructs them. So, in the end, a person would need to go to their aparment management to find out why the water might be so high all of a sudden. Or encourage them to check for leaks in other aprtments or in water lines on the property that may cause the water usage to keep going up for unknown reasons. After talking to the NW&P rep, also felt the apartment complex should encourage the leasing agents to be more forthcoming with what the renter can expect in terms of the billing they will be receiving from NW&P. In retrospect, I don't think my leasing agent was being completely honest and downplayed the additional cost of water, paid seperately from the rent. The NW&P rep was also very informative as the how the water, sewer and trash is allocated & why the numbers tend to fluctuate. I paid the balance I owed on the short pays and NW&P took off any late fees I had incurred. I haven't approached my apartments on the water issue, as my bills seems to be where it should be, now. But if I see my water shoot up again, the apartment management will be where I go to get the right answers.