On Wed, 23 Jan 2013 14:11:44 -0800 (PST), Robert Macy
wrote:






Wouldn't it be fun to be a judge on this case...

I'd say Water Company supplies water and 'might' be held accountable
only if the company has a responsibility to alert any user of what
seems like "out of the ordinary" consumption. If consumption is within
boundaries and loss not caused by them - not culpable.

Estate Agent accepted responsibility for the initial repair and
tantamountedly accepted the quality of work done by the subcontractor,
in this case the errant plumber, in two ways. First, accepted
responsibility for thie initial repair by organizing the repair and
second, by supplying a plumber at no charge to the tenant,
subsequently paying the plumber for services, and making it the Estate
Agent's responsibility to monitor the work done by the plumber. If the
landlord wished to avoid culpability, he/she should have allowed
tenant to seek repair and negotiate re-imbursement process for those
costs. THEN monitoring the workmanship would have become the
responsibility of the tenant.

In view of the fact that the tenant had NOT ignored that something was
wrong [in fact, had demonstrated the opposite by the initial
interaction] but simply had no indication of the leaking water, nor
had any other feedback mechanism that he was ignoring as the cost of
the wasted water mounted up, it is NOT possible to hold him culpable
for the water bill.

Any negotiated settlement other than this would simply alleviate some
of the burden to the responsible party, the Estate Agent. If all
parties accept such a settlement that's ok, too. But, if I were the
judge I'd put the whole blame on the Estate Agent.

Thoughts?

You make some very good points and I'd agree with you. The water
company supplied the product as used by the end user so they should be
paid. The tenant acted responsibly and the owner called an expert.

Seems to me, the owner should pay the bill and try to recover from the
"expert" that botched the job.

It should be very easy to prove the use was not taking long showers,
but a malfunction.

We has a similar situation at work. A little used toilet in a distant
bathroom was leaking water. We did get an unusually high water bill
and I did not know of any logical reason. Then one day I heard the
toilet filling and checked it out. The difference here though, out
maintenance guy is more competent than the plumber the OP had. Cost a
few hundred bucks in water though.