Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
This is in Cary, NC managed by Mid America Apartments. Community is "Waterford Forest". They charge the tenants for Cable bill. This cable bill is not part of the rent. It is charged as an addendum to the Water bill. They have some kind of agreement with Time Warner due to which tenants have to pay $35 for cable (for Standard) fee whether or not they are going to use it. If you want extra programming like Digital Cable with DVR etc you basically have to forego the $35 that you pay to the apartment and pay to Time Warner whatever they charge for the services you are requesting since Time Warner doesn't deduct the $35 that you have already been paying to the Apartment.
I do not know if it is legal binding the tenant to one Cable company and bilking them for Cable regardless of the tenant using it. I know lot of tenants use Dish/Directv etc and still end up paying the Cable bill.
Interesting thing is you can not go to/call Time Warner cable's CS numbers for any service problems. You have to go through the Apartment office to route your service requests to TWC.
Is it in the lease? If it is, probably not much you can do. If it's not, tell them you don't want it and see what they say.
It's not illegal for them to charge for utilities as long as it was agreed in the lease, and they are providing them, whether you use it or not... although it seems pretty fishy way to charge everyone an extra $35
Yes, it is in the lease. They are forcing the existing tenants to pay for cable when the lease renewal comes. They say if you do not agree, you can opt to not renew the lease and vacate.
There was some lawsuit in several other states where these agreements were illegal. If was something like if a new thing, or its billed seperately, they can charge through the addendum if you are using, but not if your not using it. If they are providing the cable as part of the apartment rental, it must be included in the rent amount as part of rent not a seperate bill. It was more baout if the charge can be sepearte and forced on everyone, or if it had to be in the monthly rental and not as a sepearte item. If in the monthly rental, it was legal, but not if it was added sepearetely.
It sounds like the property is not doing something correct with billing. They can require cable as part of the lease agreement, but not charge separately (see: make profit off cable as the middle man).
You should be able to upgrade your cable service for the difference in price for additional services. TWC should have your address in the system as an MDU property with each apartment having basic service at no cost. Then they can create a secondary account for the apartment number so that tenants can add more services like digital box and internet. The additional account would be $0 for the basic cable already being paid for by the apartment complex and only show charges for services beyond basic.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
