Hiring and Renting

Q: 

1. There are three prepaid meters for electricity, installed on a property, the administration cost is for the landlords account. 

Must the VAT cost also be carried by the landlord on the three meters? 

2. A landlord charges seperate for the electricity for example rental is R6000 per month and he charges an average R1500 for electricity some months the electricity bill comes to a lower fee some months especially in winter the charges are far higher then R1500. 

There are three houses on one property, one of the houses the landlord uses for himself. The electricity bill comes out on an average R5000 to R5500 per month. There is only one meter on the property. How does one calculate what each house is using as there is no way to find out what the exact charges are for each house. According to the shariah is this acceptable?

Q: There is a landlord that has a property. On it there are three homes. In the one main home is a close relative that stays. The other two are rented out. The relative does not pay for anything. At first, the landlord gave the administration duties to the relative but the relative could not manage it properly. 

The three homes are being fed by a single borehole for water (no municipal water) that is fed to three separate water tanks with three separate pipes to each homes. After excessive rains, the pressure pump got damaged and as a result the water pressure dropped considerably to the homes. The relative decided (while the pressure pump was attended to) to cut off one of the houses water supply so that they get a little more pressure in theirs. When the landlord came to know about it, he sent a message to them that they have no permission to do this. They ignored this message and went a step further to cut the other pipe as well and feed the main pipe to their home, resulting in that they have a little more water pressure so that they do not have a problem to shower. The landlord is in another province and is unable to attend to the problem personally. What should he do?

The one suggestion that was given is that because you are only charging rental to the two homes, the water issue is not your problem and they must sort it out themselves between the three of them and split all the costs, even the pressure pump. You were kind to supply good water pressure to their homes. If you go the extra mile you will be rewarded but there will be spiritual cost involved by being harsh with your relative. What is the Shariah way to deal with this?

Q: We have a property with several tenants from which we collect rental. Unfortunately, some tenants do not pay their rental on time and delay some times up to a few months in payment. 

We get an accountant to send a letter of demand to these tenants, which demands payment from them on their overdue accounts immediately, otherwise legal action will be taken. The accountant charges us R250 per letter - which is the market rate for such letters. 

Can we then charge this R250 to the tenant, as them not paying their account is the cause for us incurring this charge Please advise