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Ineligible Service Charges
Hi
Reading the HB regs it states that water charges are not eligible for HB. I have taken that as meaning when its due to personal use of an individual but does this also cover charges if water is being used in communal areas of a scheme (retirement in this case), e.g outside taps, communal toilet, laundry, kitchen, etc?
Thanks
Communal supply is eligible and we have used the same split as we apply to fuel, 80/20 if tenants are not separately billed for water. If they are, then the supply to communal areas should be fully eligible for HB.
If it is a fixed water rate rather than a variable charge, strictly speaking there is supposed to be a floorspace calculation rather than a consumption estimate: the deduction from the rent for HB is a proportion of the full water rate for the rateable unit “obtained by dividing the area of the dwelling occupied by the claimant by the area of the self-contained unit of which it forms part” - HB Reg 12B(5).
In practice most authorities will abide by the landlord’s specified charge unless it seems obviously skewed: 80/20 sounds like a perfectly reasonable split.
For variable charges, the Regs are more flexible: the HB deduction should be based on a reasonable estimate of the claimant’s personal consumption so if the bill includes heavy communal use for hosing down gardens etc the split might be more generous to the claimant than a floorspace area calculation would be.