DUBAI A district cooling company is billing flat owners of a building that was gutted two years ago and declared unsafe by authorities.
Apartment owners of Tamweel Tower in Jumeirah Lakes Tower (JLT), Cluster U say they are being slapped with utility charges by Palm Utilities every month despite their homes being unoccupied for the past two years ago.
All 160 apartment owners were rendered homeless when a fire struck the building on November 18, 2012. Since then the building has remained uninhabitable.
“The cooling bill for my 29th floor three-bedroom apartment is Dh6,486 so far. Every month I am billed Dh405 (Dh30 for consumption and Dh375 for capacity charge)although I have not lived there since 2012,” said Indian expat Tina Halela.
“Shortly, after the fire I paid my chiller fees for eight months thinking I would move into my flat soon. However, I realised this was not going to happen so I decided to stop paying my utility bills. When I approached the cooling company to disconnect services to my apartment, they said it could be done but that I still needed to pay the monthly capacity charge.”
Jordanian homeowner Murad Najjar, 31, whose outstanding exceeds Dh8,000 said he will not pay the charges.
“This invoice is based on a service. If we are unable to utilise the service then what is the point of such a bill?” he said.
“It is right to bill owners for fixed capacity charges if they are on vacation or if they have chosen to leave their apartment empty. But what happened in Tamweel is an exception. We have been forced out of the building. In such a situation cooling companies must make the exception and waive all charges,” Najjar added.
Pakistani Maqsood Sheikh, who owns two apartments said the cooling charges were unfair. “How can they bill us for cooling when the building has not been operational for two years. “Our other utilities like telephone, water and electricity were disconnected after the fire and they are not taking any money from us. It should be the same with cooling bills too.”
“All utility contracts must be based on government regulations and there has to be proper guidelines to protect consumers in such situations,” said Sheikh.
British expat John Cox who owns a two-bedroom apartment said doesn’t get utility bills any more. “In any case, I am not paying them. I don’t think anyone in their right mind should pay utility charges when they are not living there,” he said.
Iraqi expat Linda Shibo who has run a Dh7,572 bill hoped it would be waived.
“We have not been billed for housing, water or electricity. We hope the cooling charges will be written off too.”
Palm Utilities response
An official from Empower / Palm Utilities said they cannot reverse the chiller charges. “In line with the district cooling industry in the UAE, capacity charges have been determined to recover the investment on behalf of the unit owners or developers over a period of time. Moreover, all property owners as per their end-user agreements with Palm District Cooling are required to pay an annual capacity charge irrespective of occupancy. Unfortunately, we cannot reverse these to the owners. The cost of investment in district cooling infrastructure is something that Palm District Cooling has already paid for. For our part, we have sent a circular to all owners asking them to defer their chiller fees payment until they move back into their apartments.”
Palm Utilities has waived off disconnection fees and any late payment fees to owners until residents move back into their apartments.
