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Case ref:201407336
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Date:August 2015
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Body:Dundee City Council
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Sector:Local Government
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Outcome:Not upheld, no recommendations
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Subject:rent and/or service charges
Summary
Ms C, a council tenant, told us the council were unreasonably imposing a weekly charge for a shower. There was a shower in the flat when she moved in. Ms C said that when she signed the tenancy she assumed that the weekly shower charge was just a normal rent charge. When she asked the council about it she was told the shower could not be removed and replaced with a bath. Ms C felt she had paid unnecessarily for a basic shower which she could have had installed herself for a much lower cost.
We found the council's shower installation programme was designed to offer choice to tenants, at no cost to the council. Councils have a limited budget to spend and must decide how to use their resources carefully. It was the council's policy to impose a weekly charge for the shower installed in Ms C's home. The council provided details of the calculations, which covered a 30-year period, on which the shower charge was based.
We found that Ms C exercised choice in taking the tenancy on and that the council made her aware that there was a weekly charge for the shower which was additional to the rent. We did not uphold Ms C's complaint.