Landlords and the Tenant Utility Payment Disclosure Act

If you are an Illinois landlord, and you rent apartments where utilities are not separately metered, you should be aware of the Tenant Utility Payment Disclosure Act (765 ILCS 740/1). Under the Tenant Utility Payment Disclosure Act, the landlord must disclose, the formula he uses for determining each tenant’s share of utilities when he has multiple tenants and the utilities are not individually metered.

The landlord should disclose this information prior to demanding payment for utilities. The disclosure can be written into the lease, or consist of a separate document. The landlord’s formula should take into account the usage of all of the units metered together. Upon a tenant’s request, the landlord should also provide a copy of the whole utility bill.

Condominium associations are also required to clarify how they are billing common utilities; however, in the case of most condominium associations, utilities are billed as per the condominium declaration, based on each unit’s individual ownership share in the association.