Wellington Flat

Welcome!

Hi!

Welcome to your new flat, thanks for signing up with us. One of our goals is to try to ensure that our relationship with you is win-win; we hope to provide you somewhere nice to live and we hope you will respect our property and pay us promptly for the services we provide. If you ever have any issues with our policies or serious issues with your flatmates please feel free to contact us.

Contents

The date after each heading indicates when that section was last modified.

Contacts [2012-02-10]

Should you need to discuss something about the flat, John is your best bet. You can reach him on:

John's number is different from the number we give to prospective tenants (022 081 6010). The latter number is used solely to help people looking for help. It is not necessarily answered by somebody who can answer any detailed questions about your tenancy. If all of our rooms are full, this phone will be turned off. In general, we recommend you delete the prospective tenant number and save John's number (above) in your phone.

John is the Property Manager so please only contact Denise the Administrator if John is unavailable. She is available outside normal business hours on:

It is best to either text or call John or Denise on their respective cell phone numbers in the first instance.

If you are unable to contact either John or Denise, our other staff may be able to help you track them down. Note that their primary responsibility is not tenant liaison so they may not be able to help directly with more unusual issues. George is our network technician. His contact details are:

Graeme is responsible for maintaining the houses. He can be contacted at:

Denise is responsible for administration. If you have an administrative related issue you may contact her via email at moc.talFnotgnilleW|esineD#moc.talFnotgnilleW|esineD.

Monica and Trent are the owners of the flat. They currently live in Singapore. If you have an issue with the flat that nobody appears to be able to help with, feel free to send either of them an email outlining the problem.
Their addresses are moc.talFnotgnilleW|acinoM#moc.talFnotgnilleW|acinoM & moc.talFnotgnilleW|tnerT#moc.talFnotgnilleW|tnerT.

Key Tenant [2010-01-14]

We sometimes hire one of your flatmates as a "Key Tenant". The key tenant's main responsibility is to ensure smooth communication between the tenants in a house and the landlords. In general the key tenant works to ensure that the flat is a nice place to stay, and is kept in good order. The key tenant does this by, among other things:

• Helping to ensure smooth, timely communication between the tenants' and the landlord
• Arranging shared flat duties
• Ensuring that the landlords are aware of any damage to the flat
• Explaining flat policies
• Explaining how we manage the flat accounts, and your financial summary in particular
• Mediating disputes between your flatmates (if the flatmates involved agree)

In the interests of your privacy and security, the key tenant has no direct access to the financial information we store on your behalf. It is entirely up to you how much of this information you disclose to the key tenant.

A key tenant cannot receive money on the landlords' behalf.

Emergency Contact [2009-01-06]

If you need to contact somebody in a genuine flat related emergency, please call John on his respective cellphone. We are more than happy to reimburse you for any call costs in these cases.

Email Contact [2011-01-06]

We provide the following email addresses for tenants.

Your email will be automatically forwarded to all of our staff and stored. If your email needs a human response, Jamie will phone you at home. In either case, expect a response within four days. If you need a quicker response, please get in touch with Jamie by phone.

Use of email [2008-03-02]

We believe that email or TXT, though convenient, is an ineffective method of communicating. If you have never had unnecessary disagreements arising from this form of communication you've been a lot luckier than us. For this reason, we will endeavour to talk with you directly to sort out any issues. Where those issues are more important, we may even ask to visit you. We will save emails for the role that best suits them - keeping a record of a conversation that has already taken place or passing on data.

If you think that this policy arises from computer illiteracy in our staff - you obviously don't know our staff too well - let's have a talk!!

Money [2011-01-06]

Initial Payments [2010-01-06]

We have a policy (due to bad experiences in the past) that we must receive two weeks rent and your entire bond before we provide you a key to the house or let you move in. We are sorry to implement this policy, but assure you that we apply it to every single person who signs up with us.

You can hold a room - before you move in - by paying two weeks rent as a deposit.

Rent [2009-12-30]

Rent is one week in advance. This means that you pay one weeks rent, wait one week and then pay another week. Note that this payment is required by your contract to be an Automatic Payment (not a bill payment, bank deposit or cash payment). Please note the comments on missed payments.

Utility Bills [2011-02-10]

All of the costs of the services provided for under your contract are included in your weekly rent. The following table sets out how much these services add to your final rent bill:

If you wish to change which services you make use of, we are required by law to provide you with a replacement contract. This should be reasonably painless as we have all of your details on file - just let us know what changes you'd like. Any changes do not take affect until we have both signed the replacement contract.

As Internet services are provided over the phone line, you must pay for the phone if you wish to use the Internet. Grounds fees are not optional.

Internet Bill [2011-02-10]

If you wish to use the internet from a computer in your room you will need to use the flat's shared high bandwidth ( 8 Mb/s ) internet connection. When you sign up, you get to choose how large your data cap is each month. You are charged $2.25 per month (50c a week) for each gigabyte. Any un-used data allocation is not carried over to subsequent months.

If you exceed your bandwidth cap you will not be able to use the internet for the remainder of the month. You may purchase additional bandwidth at $3 per gigabyte. To change your data cap you will need to sign a new contract. This is an unfortunate consequence of changes to NZ law in 2010.

If you wish to have a bandwidth cap larger than 49Gb, we reduce the charge per gigabyte to $1.60 per month (36c a week) for the entire amount.

For more information on using the flat network, see below.

How high should I set my bandwidth cap? [2011-01-12]

It can be hard to estimate in advance how high to set your bandwidth cap. Here is some guidance.

Firstly, one of the advantages of the way we structure the flat is that you can get a high quality internet connection for less than a dollar a week. Normally 1Gb a month would cost you more than $6 a week. If you're a light internet user, 1Gb is heaps for irregular web browsing and email - as long as you're not downloading or watching videos.

If you intend to use Skype a lot, add another Gb or two.

If you watch a fair amount of videos online, something more like 5Gb would be closer to what you need.

If you regularly download content or use peer to peer networks, we guess you'd need upwards of 15Gb.

On average previous tenants use around 10Gb each. However, this average is spread between those that use the internet sparingly and those that do nothing but surf…

Power Bill [2011-01-10]

This covers electricity supplied to your room and the house as a whole. We set the power figure based on the previous year's usage. Think of the environment and next year's tenants (which may include you!) before turning your room into a sauna…

Telephone Bill [2011-01-06]

The single flat phone line may only be used for voice calls - any other use ( notably the internet ) is inconsiderate to your flatmates. The phone line costs you $1.40 each week.

If you have a computer and wish to connect it to the internet, please refer to the section devoted to this topic later in this document.

Due to the management overhead of tracking down toll calls when the bill arrives, we no longer allow toll calls from the flats. We recommend that tenants make use of "calling cards" instead. These are sold in many places, including dairies and supermarkets. If you would like more information on these, please get in touch.

For those new to NZ, calls within the Wellington region or to numbers starting "0800" are free and can be made (directly) from the flat phone. Any other numbers starting with "0", such as "021 732953" or "09 7653923" are chargeable. These chargeable calls are described as toll calls and the flat phone will not connect the call.

If you will never use the flat phone line you can let us know not to charge you for it. We can only do this if you also don't use the shared flat internet, as the flat network uses the flat phone line to connect to the outside world.

Digital television [2009-01-06]

We provide you with access to free digital satellite TV in the lounge. See http://www.freeviewnz.tv/ for more information.

It is possible for the television in the lounge to be hooked up to Sky Digital (http://www.skytv.co.nz/). Sky's charges amount to a monthly cost for each tenant of around $13. This includes both the movies and sports channels. If you wish to do this, please get in touch (you may not organise this yourself directly).

There is more information on using a television in your room below.

Care of the grounds [2011-01-10]

This covers the cost of contractors keeping the outside of the house neat and tidy.

Wheeli-Bin [2011-01-10]

Some flats have an extra wheeli-bin (rubbish bin with wheels) to make it easier to manage rubbish. This fee covers the associated service cost.

How you are charged [2011-01-06]

We maintain a virtual account for each tenant. This account offsets the total amount of payments you have made to us against your rent and utility bills. We send you an email summary of your virtual account by email early each month.

If your account balance becomes too large (either because you owe us or we owe you - but most often the former ;) we will get in touch with you.

The monthly email summary only contains summary information. We provide a full account statement when your tenancy ends. If you would like to check our calculations before then, an interim statement is available upon request.

Your virtual account does not include your bond. We have no access to this money - it is held by the Department of Building and Housing. Bond monies are only dealt with when your tenancy ends. See the department's web page for more information.

Ownership of the bills [2011-01-06]

We have always managed the bills for our tenants. Since the Residential Tenancies Amendment Act 2010 this has now become a legal requirement.

You have no obligation to pay the bills from the companies providing the utilities. Your obligations are set out in full in your contract.

Payments to our bank account [2011-01-12]

It is vital you include your name and room number as a reference with any payment made. It can be very difficult to decide where something like:

(which is a real example) comes from. Often, like in this case, we are left trying to guess who paid by the amount. This of course is not the most reliable way to ensure that we record the fact that you have paid us.

Monica and I have recently taken on a policy that we do not assign such payments to a person. Instead, we maintain a list of the unallocated payments. When somebody tells us that they really did pay us three months ago, we have a look at the list.

There are several ways of ensuring that your name is on your payment, depending on how you are making the payment:

1. Rent Payments. Your contract is quite explicit about how rent payments should be made (partially to avoid the problems described above). They need to be made by Automatic Payment with details in this form: RENT, 810S4, PETER. Please let us know if you have trouble setting up your payments in this manner.
2. Electronic Payments (Automatic Payments / Bill Payments / Funds Transfers / One Off Payments). In this case your source account name will appear on our statement. So long as it is obvious from this who you are, there should be no problem.
3. Deposits in a bank. In this case you must request that the teller put your name in the details field on the transaction before you give the teller your money. Often a teller won't be able to put a note on the transaction after they have entered the transaction.

Payments to the key tenant [2010-01-14]

The key tenant is not authorised to receive money on the landlords' behalf.

Contract [2007-03-28]

Fixed Term [2007-03-28]

The vast majority of our contracts are fixed term. If your contract is periodic, this section does not apply to you.

As your contract is fixed term, neither of us may terminate the contract until the contract end date - generally in January. The only exceptions to this involve mutual consent or breaking the law. This means that - even if you move out - you are still liable for all rent charges until the point that we find somebody to occupy your room.

That being said, we are willing to let you replace your contract with somebody else's. For example, one of our tenants - T - wished to leave after their studies finished in June. They found a replacement tenant - M - who took a fixed term contract from June through to January. We were happy to consider T's contract terminated. T had to take on the time and hassle of finding and arranging M however. We got involved at the point that M was ready to sign a contract.

Services [2011-02-06]

We provide several services to you - phone, television, internet, gardening, computer assistance and power. In the case of most of these, we make use of a utility company to provide the actual service, and we "add value" before providing it to you.

One value we always add is to manage the bills for you - you will not need to worry about whether the power company is paid. You will also not have to chase up money from other tenants to make those payments. Your sole responsibility is to ensure that you pay us your rent on time. We do not charge you anything for managing the bills for you (nor is it "hidden" in the service charges).

We ensure that you have access to each of these services in your room. Most rooms now have several power points. Each room has an access point for internet, telephone and satellite television. The provision of these access points requires some management and wiring on our part. The internet, as well as needing wiring, also requires three dedicated pieces of computer hardware. Satellite TV requires a dish, amplifier and splitter hardware. We also employ a network technician to ensure that the provision of internet is as hassle free for our tenants as possible.

No tenant is authorised to modify the wiring for these services, nor the associated hardware. If a tenant causes an interruption to any of these services we will pass on the repair costs to that tenant. If the tenant cannot be identified, the charges will be shared amongst the flat as a whole.

Most network maintenance will be carried out by George. George and Graeme may also carry out reallocation and maintenance work on the telephone and television wiring from time to time. If you need extra services to those we currently provided, please let us know what you need. We will try and help out.

Note that it is illegal for you to directly arrange to have anything installed in or on the house. This includes, for example, extra phone lines or Sky dishes. We will charge you for the removal of these devices and all costs in returning the house to its previous appearance.

Internet [2009-01-06]

The flat internet we provide is high quality - true broadband.

Each room has a network connection point. If you have a computer and would like to connect it to the internet, let us know. George (our network technician) will hook your computer up to the internet for you. This process generally takes less than 20 minutes. If you have an old computer, there may be some additional requirements; George will explain these to you.

The internet connection is shared, so be considerate in your use of it.

We have had tenants with Windows PCs who have had their computers taken over by hackers. The software the hackers installed ran up over $1,500 worth of excess fees as, at the time, we didn't limit tenant's bandwidth. Now you risk having your entire data allocation used up in the first few days of the month.

If you are using a Windows based PC, we therefore strongly encourage you to ensure you have continuously updated anti-spy-ware and anti-virus software. We advise against personal firewalls however. The internet at the flat is behind a true (hardware) firewall. We have had several issues with personal firewalls causing internet connection problems for our tenants.

We only hook your computer up to the flat internet for free when you first move in. If your computer needs to be reconfigured after this you will need to pay for this service (refer Computer Servicing, below). If you have a computer savvy friend, all of the information they would need to organise this for you is listed in the technical details section, below.

You may already have an account with an ISP (Internet Service Provider - Paradise, XTRA etc.) that you do not wish to close. One reason to keep an account open is in order to keep your favourite email address. Another would be if you needed to use your computer somewhere other than at the flat.

It is possible to keep your account open and not be charged too much. If your account is a dial up account, you can generally change these to an "email only" or "pay as you use" plans. These only charge you for the amount of time you are logged in with a dial up modem. As you no longer need to use a modem, your charges could be $0! Some ISPs charge a small fixed monthly fee for these plans.

Modems [2011-02-06]

You may not connect to the internet using the flat phone line. We strongly recommend you use the shared flat internet, which provides a high quality service at significantly less than the price of a dial up modem connection. If you decide you must use a modem, you will need to arrange a separate phone line. Please refer to the section on the telephone service below.

Connection Details [2011-02-06]

This section is optional reading - if you are interested in what our internet plan is. The information here may change without notice.

Our connection plan is currently provided via http://www.snap.net.nz.

The network hardware we maintain shares this amongst all tenants who opt to use it. This means that the bandwidth you actually get at your computer depends on who else in the flat is using it. In reality, it also depends on how busy things are at Telecom's exchange as well.

Technical details [2011-02-06]

This section is optional reading - it is basically intended for geeks… ;) If you are not a geek, George will apply these settings on your computer for you.

DHCP is not enabled on the flat network (we wish to control the IP allocation). Your IP number is static at 192.168.1.x. x is the number of your room multiplied by 8. If you are in room 1, your IP number is 192.168.1.8. In room 4 that would be 192.168.1.32.

Should you have multiple computers, you can use the other 7 IP numbers up to the next room's first allocation. That is, room 3 can also use from 192.168.1.25 to 192.168.1.31.

Setting your IP will allow you to interact with other users on the flat network. It will not allow you to access the internet, as bandwidth is assigned to specific MAC addresses. For this reason, you will need to let George know how to split up your data cap (in your contract) among whatever MAC addresses you may have.

The gateway computer is at 192.168.1.254. It provides a DNS server - so point your computer's DNS client at this. There isn't much point specifying additional DNS servers as you can't get to them without going through the gateway.

Telephone [2007-03-28]

We provide a single "flat" phone line. As nobody is allowed to use this to connect to the internet, and cellphones have become very popular, this has generally proved sufficient.

Your room has a telephone connection point. This is normally hooked up to the "flat" phone line. All you need to do is plug in a telephone. There are several shops (for example The Warehouse, Dick Smiths or Jaycar) that sell cheap telephones if you don't have one.

If you choose to use a modem to access the internet, you must organise your own phone line. This will probably cost you around $60 to install and then $40 a month. On top of this you will need to pay for a dial up connection. You would want to have a good reason for doing this - the shared internet only costs around $12 a month and provides significantly higher bandwidth.

Television [2011-03-04]

Each bedroom has a satellite television connector. This allows you to set up a private television in your room and get a digital quality picture!

You have two choices of provider. Freeview (http://www.freeviewnz.tv/) provides digital television services for free. To receive the signal, you will need a television with a digital decoder, or a digital set-top box (similar to the device in the lounge). You can purchase your own set-top box for around $200 (from Dick Smith, Jaycar etc.) or lease one from us for $100 per year. Contact us or check out http://www.freeviewnz.tv/ for more information.

Sky (http://www.skytv.co.nz/) provides a greater selection of programs, but charges a monthly access fee. You will not need to pay for installation as we have sorted that out for you already. All you will need is a Sky decoder and a cable to connect to the socket on the wall. Sky will provide both, however you will need to get the correct cable. The easiest approach is probably to pass on the following information to Sky when you sign up.

The socket on the wall is a Belling Lee female socket. Decoders usually have F connector sockets. This gives you two choices.

1. Put a converter on the end of the standard Sky cable (F plug to F plug). The converter would be a F connector socket to a Belling Lee male plug, here is Dick Smith's converter.
2. Use your own cable - An F connector plug (decoder end) to Belling Lee male plug (wall socket), here is a 10m cable from Dick Smith.

Contact us if you have any problems.

Computer Servicing [2007-03-28]

If you have a computer problem, George may be able to help.

You may contact him, as above. If you have a software problem he may be able to solve it on the phone. If the problem is hardware related or a complicated software problem he is available to travel to the flat to assist.

Note that this is not a free service. We charge $10 for each full or partial quarter hour spent. There is a one hour minimum, and travel time is included. Thus, 36 minutes costs $40, 67 minutes costs $50 etc. These charges will be added to your flat bill.

New Tenants [2007-03-28]

Vetting [2004-08-22]

We do not use the most common tenancy arrangement where there is a single key tenant responsible to the landlords. Under this arrangement, the key tenant guarantees us a fixed income for the flat per week, irrespective of the number of tenants. This usually means that when one of your flatmates moves out, you would have to pay more money to cover the cost of their rooms as well. Naturally this means that the remaining tenants are usually quite eager to find somebody to fill the empty room.

Our contracts with you are on an individual room basis, however, which means that this is not a risk you face. When a tenant moves out, you pay exactly the same weekly rental as always. In this case the onus is on us to find a new person to get our income back. Monica and I have made two decisions because of this situation:

1. We do not give tenants the right to veto any new tenant for free
2. We make a "best effort" (only) to allow current tenants to meet potential tenants

Naturally we try to get tenants in who are responsible and reasonably similar to the existing tenants - that is in our best interests as much as it is in yours. We have made mistakes in the past, but we have had a reasonable number of tenants over the years and I'd like to think we've learned. Prior bad eggs have also lead to changes in our processes. For example we now require photo ID and money up front before we allow somebody to take a room. Unfortunately we have learnt the hard way that it's impossible to always accurately assess people's character in such a short period of time. We have had occasions where a tenant who complained bitterly about our poor judgement on one person then went on to sign up another person who also had issues. Because of this, if you do meet up with a potential tenant and have concerns, we will definitely listen to your concerns.

We can't delay the sign up process by any significant amount to arrange for existing flatmates to prospective tenants. As with any sale, it is really important to strike while the iron is hot. Therefore, if you decide you are unable to make an extra effort to meet a potential flatmate, we are likely to sign them up if they are interested.

If you decide that this situation is untenable to you, there is another option. If you choose, you can pay for the right to have a veto over new tenants. With this veto right, we will not sign up a new tenant until you have agreed that they can move in.

The cost to have this right is a share of the lost rentals until such time as the room is occupied again. The cost of the lost rentals is divided equally amongst those people with a veto right in a particular flat, with the owners counting as two. If two people in one of the flats decide they want veto rights, however, the lost rentals would be apportioned half to Monica and Trent, and a quarter each to the two people with veto rights.

You can ask for veto rights at any point; even when a potential flatmate is visiting. However, you will be required to pay the veto fees up until the point the room is let.

We will TXT anybody that wishes to meet with potential tenants so that you can have a chance to meet with them. If you would like us to do this, please let us know.

We will call the flat just before we bring any new tenant around in any case.

Finders Fee [2004-08-22]

When we are looking for a tenant, we will pay you $50 for any efforts you make that helps secure somebody, provided they stay for at least 3 months. Help includes finding somebody to take the room, showing a potential tenant around the flat and suchlike. We pay the money as soon as the tenant moves in. Should they not stay the required 3 months, we request it back from you.

House Inspections [2011-01-12]

We inspect the houses at least every three months. These inspections usually occur on the first Saturday of the months of April, July, October and January.

The main purpose of these inspections is to ensure that the house is being kept up to a reasonable standard.

There is a complete check-list available on request. The list includes the following items:

1. Check your room.
2. Check that all the appliances and kitchen is clean and presentable
3. Check to see that all freezers are defrosted.
4. Check bathrooms are clean and hygenic.
5. Check that all light bulbs work.
6. Check that the smoke alarms are operational.

We will let you know the results of the inspection once they are complete.

If you fail any particular item on two consecutive flat inspections, we will arrange for that particular issue to be rectified. The cost this incurs will be shared between you and your flatmates.

If you wish, you may let us know at these visits of any outstanding issues with the flat.

By current NZ law we are permitted to inspect the properties more regularly. We may do so if we have concerns that our property is not being treated with due respect. In this case we will provide 48 hours notice of our intent to visit.

Flat Policies [2011-02-10]

Couples staying in the flat [2011-02-10]

We allow couples to stay in the flat, with the proviso that each tenant must have a contract for one room.

In practise, for couples, this means that a couple must rent two rooms in the flat. How the rooms are used is completely up to the couple (bedroom / study, two bedrooms etc).

We implemented this policy to be fair on the other tenants in the house. Each flat is quite large with a good number of people already present. The services in the house (bathroom, kitchen space etc.) are designed to provide for the requirements of the number of rooms in the house. Extra people strain these limited resources.

It is also true that two people have more say in how the flat is run than one. This is unfair if they are only - effectively - paying half as much money as the other tenants for having their say.

Note that the contract forbids one partner taking a room and then inviting the other tenant to live with them for an extended period.

No external lock on room door [2008-03-02]

We do not allow tenants to have an external lock on their bedroom doors. This means that your room cannot be locked when you are not in it.

There are two reasons for this policy. The first is that it is the responsibility of each tenant to ensure that all possessions in the house are secure, not just their own. This is achieved by locking the main doors to the house. As nobody can lock their room individually, to secure their own belongings they must secure everybody else's as well by locking the house as a whole. We recommend that you adopt a policy of always locking the external doors when you leave the house. Burglars have attempted to access one of our houses and failed because the main door was locked. None of our flats have yet been successfully burglarised, touch wood.

The second reason is trust. You may feel that you need a lock on your door because you do not trust one of your flatmates. This situation cannot be rectified with a lock; unless it is addressed it will poison the atmosphere in the flat. This issue will need to be discussed amongst the flat. If you are unable to rectify this problem internally let one of our staff know.

Some rooms have a sliding bolt which can be used to secure the room when you are inside it. If your room does not have such a lock, and you would be more comfortable with this extra security, let us know. We will arrange to have a sliding lock installed.

Missed Payments [2009-12-30]

We have recently implemented a firm policy on missed tenants' payments. This policy will be irrelevant to the majority of our tenants, but will help us manage problem tenants promptly.

1. If a tenant misses a fortnightly payment, we immediately send a 14 day notice.
2. If a tenant misses two consecutive fortnightly payments, we send a 14 day notice, and book a hearing with the Tenancy Tribunal.

If you find that you missed a payment by accident, get in touch with us as soon as possible. If you contact us before we notice the missed payment and tell us that you have paid the money owed - or are about to pay - we can use our discretion in the application of these policies.

Bad Debtors [2009-12-30]

Should you get into financial difficulties, it is in both your interest and ours that you talk to us - and as soon as possible. We have helped several tenants work their way out of debt.

If you intend to treat us fairly you can safely skip the rest of this section.

Unfortunately we also have experience dealing with delinquent tenants. You will not be surprised that we do not treat lightly the idea of somebody walking away owing us money. This is the reason we have the clause in the contract allowing us to pass on collection costs to delinquent tenants.

After you move out… [2004-08-22]

Hopefully this isn't too soon after you move in, but chances are it'll happen at some point. The following sections explain what our normal procedures are at that time.

Key [2008-03-02]

The charge for replacing your room key is $20. This takes into account the fee charged to have the key cut as well as the time spent in arranging it. To avoid this charge, ensure you return your key as you leave the flat! If you do not meet up with one of our staff as you are leaving, please mail the key back to us. Do not leave the key in the flat, as this reduces the security of the flat.

Condition of Room [2008-03-02]

When your tenancy ends, we may inspect your room to ensure that it is in a condition similar to that in which you started renting it. If repair work needs to be done, this will be added to your final bill. If you have damaged your walls by affixing objects to them, this will need to be repaired.

Final Financial Report & Bond [2011-02-06]

Expect to receive your bond back about two weeks after you move out. Here is the process we follow:

We will prepare and send you a "Tenant's Financial Report". This tabulates every aspect of your financial relationship with us - the payments we received, and the rent you accrued.

Once we have sent you the final report, you will need to review this and let us know if you agree that it is accurate. Once we agree, we can sort out how the final amount is settled. If we owe you money, we will return your bond in full. If, as is more common, the final amount is in our favour we can split the bond to cover this amount. The bond is integrally involved in this final settlement process. For this reason, we cannot return it to you until we have agreed on the final amount and how it will be settled.

If you have requested extra services (for example a Sky decoder) there may be extra charges involved (for example if there was a 12 month minimum usage requirement).

What we do with your mail [2009-01-06]

There is a tray in the flat for ex-tenant's mail. When you are resident at the flat, please put any mail for ex-tenants in this tray. After you leave, you may retrieve your mail from this tray.

Any mail older than one month is discarded during the house inspection.

NZ Post have a postal redirection service.

New Zealand Law [2011-02-06]

New Zealand changed residential tenancy law in 2010. As we rent more than five rooms in a single house, we are now described under the law as a "boarding house". We do not believe that this is an accurate description of the house, but it is the term used in the law and everybody is required to follow the stipulations for a "boarding house" regardless of whether that particular label seems relevant.

The Residential Tenancy Act 2010 has an entire section devoted to "boarding houses". These changes affected the services we could provide you, and we have changed our business practices to comply. You may review the relevant section here. If you have any questions, feel free to direct them to us or the Tenancy Services section of the government.

About this document [2010-01-14]

The current version of this document is permanently available at http://wellingtonflat.com/how-the-flat-is-run. Older versions may be viewed by clicking on the "history" link at the bottom of the page.