{"id":72840,"date":"2022-10-18T21:43:45","date_gmt":"2022-10-18T19:43:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/radioislam.org.za\/a\/?p=72840"},"modified":"2022-10-18T21:43:45","modified_gmt":"2022-10-18T19:43:45","slug":"can-you-cut-off-electricity-to-tenants-who-owe-you-money","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/radioislam.org.za\/a\/can-you-cut-off-electricity-to-tenants-who-owe-you-money\/","title":{"rendered":"Can you cut off electricity to tenants who owe you money?"},"content":{"rendered":"

2 min
\n18 October 2022
\n22:00
\n<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"Poor-paying tenants impact an owner\u2019s bond repayments as municipal charges continue to mount.<\/p>\n

Many rental property owners are dealing with non-paying tenants and are wondering if they have the authority to turn off the electricity to their property.<\/p>\n

Radio Islam International speaks with a legal expert and founder of the law firm Schoeman Law Inc. about this quandary.<\/p>\n

The Gauteng high court heard the Wilrus Trading v Dey Street Properties case, in which a commercial property owner disconnected electricity service due to a tenant\u2019s failure to pay the electricity bill.<\/p>\n

The tenants in question conducted their business from the premises of the property on Dey Street \u2013 owned by Dey Street Properties.<\/p>\n

The lease agreement was terminated, but the tenants refused to leave.<\/p>\n

They opened a court case against the managing agents and the metering service provider when their access to water and electricity was cut.<\/p>\n

However, the tenant was reinstated because the owner did not follow the procedure and took matters into their own hands.<\/p>\n

The court ruled in favour of the tenants because the provision of electricity constituted material interference in possession of the property itself.<\/p>\n

Furthermore, the court held that it was difficult not to conclude that interference with the electricity supply materially interferes with the tenant\u2019s possession of the property.<\/p>\n

Schoeman Louw stated that if the commercial property owner had followed the proper procedures, the reinstatement would not have occurred.<\/p>\n

She stated that the cancellation of the lease agreement necessitates a relevant notice, which must be delivered under the contract you have with the tenant.<\/p>\n

She also mentioned that municipalities have their internal process for disconnecting services.<\/p>\n

Schoeman stated that tenants must be informed of their non-payment or poor performance, even though many municipalities have by-laws allowing utility disconnection.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo avoid irregularities, landlords should begin reporting any issues with tenants in court as soon as possible,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

[LISTEN] to the podcast here<\/a><\/p>\n

By Nokwanda Dlangamandla
\nkzn@radioislam.org.za<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

2 min 18 October 2022 22:00 Poor-paying tenants impact an owner\u2019s bond repayments as municipal charges continue to mount. Many rental property owners are dealing with non-paying tenants and are wondering if they have the authority to turn off the electricity to their property. Radio Islam International speaks with a legal expert and founder of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[28,31,4995],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-72840","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-latest-news","category-podcasts","category-south-africa"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pc0QIf-iWQ","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-20 20:19:24","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/radioislam.org.za\/a\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72840","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/radioislam.org.za\/a\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/radioislam.org.za\/a\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radioislam.org.za\/a\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radioislam.org.za\/a\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=72840"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/radioislam.org.za\/a\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72840\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/radioislam.org.za\/a\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=72840"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radioislam.org.za\/a\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=72840"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radioislam.org.za\/a\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=72840"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}