Bills Made Simple
The majority of Purple Frog's student accommodation has bills included in the rent. However, in a few properties you will need to organise a bills package for yourselves. If this is the case, we can help. We will organise a bills-inclusive package for you and your housemates. This makes it easier to budget and means that bills are split equally and fairly.
You can choose a basic package with water, gas and electricity. Or to make living as simple as possible, include your student essentials, such as Broadband, into the package. This means you'll have easy to manage bills, spilt fairly. So, there's no falling out over who needs to pay what or having to juggle paperwork from all of the utilities companies.
What is your fair use policy?
You can read it on our fair use policy page.
Getting Bills That Aren’t Yours?
Sometimes you may receive utility bills (and occasionally default of payment notifications or bailiff letters) addressed to previous tenants or ‘To the occupier’, please don’t panic. If you have all bills included in your rent, ignore these.
If you're organising bills yourself simply give the relevant company a phone call or submit a contact form via their website and advise them of the date you moved in and they will send out new bills in your names and stop sending you ones from previous tenants.
If you have trouble, offer to send them a copy of your Contract to support your comments. You can get this from us if you’ve lost yours.
Do It Yourself
When you move in make sure you take a note of the gas and electric meter readings (usually downstairs towards the front of the house and sometimes outside – if you get stuck, you can ask us or your landlord). Once you’ve got these it’s also very important that you choose a supplier and take out a contract with them to secure you the best rates for the period of your tenancy.
If you don’t, you will be on an ‘out - of - contract’ billing system from whichever company supplies the property and these are very expensive.
There is no retrospective way to get out of this either. uSwitch offer a completely free energy price comparison service. They will ask you some basic questions and let you know which energy provider is best in your area. You'll need to know who your current supplier is first, see below to see how you can work out who your supplier is.
Who Is My Current Supplier?
You may receive letters from utility suppliers when you move into your house, either address to you personally or to 'The Occupier'. If you open these letters it will be apparent who your current suppliers are.
WATER: In Birmingham and Nottingham your water supplier is Severn Trent (www.stwater.co.uk). In Bristol your water supplier is Bristol Water (www.bristolwater.co.uk).
ELECTRICITY: Visit www.westernpower.co.uk and click the 'Who is my supplier' link on the bottom left hand side of the web page.
GAS: Either visit www.findmysupplier.energy or call 0870 6081 524 and answer the questions to find out who your supplier is.
What Happens When I Change Suppliers?
You will automatically enter into a contract with the company who supplies the property when you move into it so you need to contact them first to ensure they put you on a tariff which is applicable to you.
Once you've decided which supplier you wish to move to, you'll need to call up that supplier and give them your meter readings and set up an account. The new supplier will contact the current supplier to arrange the transfer. The old supplier will send you a final bill based on the meter readings, you will need to pay this. Your new supplier will then bill you into the future as agreed.
You will need to make sure you're up to date with paying your utilities payments when you are trying to switch as sometimes companies won't let you switch if you are behind with your payments.
When you leave
We will ask you to prove that all of your utilities are paid when you leave your property. We will need to see this before we are able to return your deposit to you. When you are asking for your last bill you must make sure to provide your suppliers with the correct meter readings and the date MUST be the last date of your tenancy.
