Open the door 

How the housing and communal services system was born in Russia. What is a management company? Interesting facts about housing and communal services in the world

House management

The Housing Code of Russia obliges citizens to pay for housing and communal services. At the same time, the performers utilities I can be legal entities or individual entrepreneurs. They acquire resources, carry out work and are responsible for the serviceability of all intra-house communications.

The right to use public services:

Residential owners with their families;

Persons who received housing from a cooperative organization;

Tenants of premises; persons renting an apartment (room).

Public utilities:

Drinking cold water. Delivery must be around the clock. It is carried out through the central or intra-house network. The volume and quality of water must be at the appropriate level.

Hot water. Must be submitted 24 hours a day centralized networks for all areas of the house.

Water disposal. The disposal of wastewater should also be round-the-clock - through centralized networks and in-house systems. sewer systems should be in most living areas of the house. If there is no centralized sewerage in the dwelling, then it should not be taken into account in the list of utilities.

Power supply. Electricity in the required volume should also be supplied around the clock, without interruption. However, power outages are recorded on metering devices. Note that resource-supplying organizations are not required to maintain networks inside the house. The consumer is obliged to report the data of the metering device before the date indicated in the receipt. If the data has not been received, then the RSO has the right to calculate the volume of consumption according to the standards in the event that a system has not been installed in which the data from the metering devices are automatically sent to the dispatching organization.

You will have to pay for common house expenses even if you have not lived in the apartment for some time. The volume of common house services is calculated taking into account the area occupied by each. In the absence of a common house meter, the calculation is made according to the standards. Experts assure that it is very beneficial to have both a common house and drive meters at the same time. They allow you to calculate the "left" connections to the general house electrical network. They also make it clear in which entrance they know how to save money, and in which they don’t.

Gas supply. Gas must be supplied around the clock. Gas metering devices provide real savings and quickly pay off in apartments with a large number of residents.

Heating. Thermal energy should be supplied to houses, apartments and non-residential premises centrally. Residents were charged for common house heating costs. No need to pay for heating the entrance, where there are no batteries. In 2013, new changes were made that relate to the rules for the provision of public services. Regulatory coefficients were introduced for those who are in no hurry to install individual metering devices. For such owners, increased standards have been introduced for all types of CG. The pay goes up every six months. As a result, the excess will reach 60%.

Housing services:

Provision for use of residential premises under a social tenancy agreement or a contract for the rental of residential premises of state or municipal housing stock;

Removal of solid and liquid household waste from apartment buildings.

Housing and communal payments

For employers:

For the use of residential premises (rental fee);

For owners:

For the maintenance and repair of residential premises. Consists of service fees and management of the apartment building. The owner of the premises in the MKD is obliged to bear the costs of maintaining not only the premises belonging to him, but also the common property in the house: house structures, corridors, stairwells, attics and basements, engineering networks, elevators and garbage chutes, etc. Article 39 of the LC RF. Moreover, the amount of the amount is determined by the residents themselves at the meeting of the owners of MKD. This is stated in parts 2 and 4 of Art. 158 ZhK RF.

The managing organization has the right to offer to take into account certain works and costs. Sometimes management companies offer a reduced list of services and works for the maintenance and current repair of the house for the maximum cost, which is annually set by the local administration. "Missing" services are offered to be paid additionally. This, of course, should not be. The list of services for the maintenance of the house and work on current repairs is in the Decree of Rosstroy 170 of September 23, 2003.
Do not confuse maintenance fees with Maintenance COMMON PROPERTY of MKD owners, included in the payment, and paid work for minor repairs in your apartment, which are performed according to your order.

extra lines

Bills periodically appear next to legitimate utilities and housing services with antennas, cable TV or the Internet, radio, locking device, concierge, parking security and so on. All these services are neither communal nor residential. Putting them on payroll is illegal. Such payments should be excluded from the single payment document. Do not allow the MA to include a vague clause in the management agreement about its right to conclude any other agreements. Otherwise, they may impose unnecessary services on you. All additional solutions accepted at the meeting.

Since 1989, a period of reforming the housing and communal services began in East Germany. But the basic conditions for the orderly operation of housing enterprises began to operate only from October 1991. The prerequisites for reforms were created by a number of factors that took place in the field of payment of operating costs, housing ownership, the structure of residential complex enterprises and pricing. The housing sector in East Germany was focused on achieving quantitative results. Priority was given to the mass construction of new housing, where the main investments were directed. The purpose of the housing policy was to increase the volume and area of ​​the housing stock, while the maintenance and repair of existing housing was not given due attention. At the same time, new construction was carried out with extremely low quality. As a result, the housing stock and intra-house infrastructure deteriorated, and the wear and tear of new buildings quickly set in.

Most flats in East Germany were owned by the state or municipalities. Some apartments were owned by associations. These were the so-called Associations of Housing Construction Workers, which is similar to Soviet housing construction cooperatives. Some houses were privately owned. As a rule, these were small buildings designed for one or more families. There was no division of payment by types of services. There was a rent, which included rent and operating costs. There was also no difference in operating costs by types of services - water, heat, etc. It should also be noted that there was no concept of resource saving. A policy to reduce the consumption of heat and electricity, as well as to introduce metering devices and charge payments according to their testimony, was not carried out. State subsidies were provided to the population as follows:

  • The population living in the public housing stock received subsidies directly. In other words, even before the reform in East Germany, there was a mechanism for providing targeted subsidies.
  • Housing workers' associations received subsidies through utilities.
  • Subsidies were not provided to owners of private houses.

In this regard, in most cases, the funds of private owners were not enough to maintain the housing stock. The supply of electricity, heat and gas was carried out by the so-called supra-regional energy enterprises. The property of these enterprises was state-owned, and they were responsible for supplying the region assigned to them. This structure resembled the Ukrainian one. Water supply and sanitation was carried out by water supply and treatment enterprises Wastewater organized at the county level. Prices for housing and communal services were formed by the state and remained at the same level for decades. The subsidies provided were included in the cost of services. Such pricing did not allow maintaining and modernizing the communal infrastructure at the proper level, and was a tangible burden on the budget. As a result, the infrastructure was dilapidated, and measures to reduce the loss of resources during transportation, protection environment and attracting investments were financed in an extremely small amount. As a result, the following prerequisites for reforming the housing and communal services of East Germany were revealed:

  • The dilapidated state of the intra-house and communal infrastructures led to large losses of resources.
  • Information about the technical condition of the infrastructure was unavailable or completely absent.
  • The tariff pricing system did not allow covering costs.
  • The calculation of utilities was mainly carried out according to consumption standards, and not on the basis of meter readings.
  • Consumers of services were not interested in saving resources.
  • Housing and communal services were provided with low quality.

The goal of reforming the housing and communal services of East Germany was to create a market for housing and communal services with competition in various sectors of the economy. The basis of the reform was the construction of a system of effective municipal self-government. For this it was necessary, first of all:

  • Demonopolize and corporatize supra-regional service providers
  • Modernize public infrastructure and housing stock
  • Improve pricing to cover existing costs.

The implementation of the set goals consisted in the following activities. Improving pricing and modernizing infrastructure In order to improve pricing, first of all, it was necessary to work out schemes that would allow covering current costs in the medium term. To do this, the first step was to abandon the provision of social assistance to the population through public utilities and the transition to targeted subsidies. Subsidies were provided to low-income families depending on their income. The principle has been developed: the unsecured segments of the population receive assistance at the expense of the rich, and not along with them, as happens with tariff subsidies. As a result, the released budget funds were directed as investments in the modernization of networks and equipment. Funds were allocated through the provision of grants and loans at low interest rates. Loans aimed at the modernization of the housing stock were provided by both the German Federal Government, municipalities, energy suppliers and the European Community. It is also necessary to note a significant increase in the cost of services and, at the same time, a transition to payment for the services provided according to their actual consumption. This led to savings of resources by the population and their individual consumption. Privatization of the housing stock After the reunification of East and West Germany, special attention was paid to the privatization of the municipal and state housing stock. Unlike the situation in Ukraine, privatization was carried out through the sale of state and municipal housing. There was no free privatization. The privatization of the housing stock was aimed at:

  • Creation of individual private property
  • Mobilization of private initiative and responsibility
  • Raising funds for the maintenance, repair and modernization of housing.

Housing cooperatives were transformed into cooperatives registered with the courts that keep the commercial register, and thus became legally capable and independent. This was accompanied by an increase in the responsibility of housing enterprises for the payment of all utilities and the abolition of state subsidies for this. A mandatory condition for the implementation of the reform was 100% registration of condominiums. Not a single house should have been left without an owner (including a collective one). The owners make better use of the property than the municipal government does for them. Demonopolization and corporatization of communal enterprises The entire sphere of housing and communal services was given into private hands, but at the same time transparent schemes for the activities of enterprises were provided. The land became the property of the enterprises. On the basis of state supra-regional enterprises, the so-called city and municipal companies (Stadtwerke) were created in the form of joint-stock companies. The ownership of such companies was mixed, and they specialized in providing a full range of services: electricity, heat and gas. Part of the enterprises for the supply of water and wastewater treatment passed into the ownership of municipalities on a public legal basis, and part joined the structure of urban utility companies. Market conditions have been created for the operation of utility companies. Service providers began to be selected on a competitive basis, this was enshrined in new legislation. In this regard, improving the quality of public services, reducing losses in the networks and reducing costs turned out to be in the foreground for the owners. Also, in order to succeed in a competitive environment, it was not enough for urban utilities to supply resources and charge for their consumption. There was a need to provide consumers with a number of additional services. A new term has emerged - "multi-utility". The result was a more aggressive and creative business policy. For example, in addition to their core business, city utility companies include house cleaning, waste collection and disposal, building infrastructure maintenance, equipment management, and telecommunications in their multi-faceted service packages. Such organizations have a holding structure, distributed by type of activity, which makes it possible to finance less developing or socially significant areas at the expense of more successful ones. After the reunification of Germany, 15 large regional energy plants in its eastern part were to be transferred to private energy supply enterprises from West Germany. The federal government believed that it was this method of restructuring that would provide stable funding for far from new housing and communal infrastructure. However, the leadership, for example, Frankfurt an der Oder (East Germany) considered that such a decision infringes on the rights of citizens. In their opinion, the replacement of the former state monopoly in the face of the plant with another monopoly, but a private one, in the person of the West German energy concern, is not the best solution. The Frankfurt public utility, in the form of a holding company, was initially 100% owned by the municipality. In addition to heat and electricity, it was engaged in gas and water supply, sewerage and garbage collection. Local authorities claim that the creation of a diversified enterprise with a flexible structure allows them to achieve "synergistic" effects (effects from interaction) in technical, organizational, financial and economic terms. Municipalities eventually began to pursue a policy of attracting investors by selling them a block of shares in the municipal monopoly. Dozens of other companies have appeared that have begun to successfully compete with the municipal structure. Consumers quickly realized the charm of competition, willingly buying the services of energy service companies, which began to offer a wide range of services on leasing, credit, self-financing energy saving measures. In Germany with a population of 70 million, 59.9% of the inhabitants, or over 40 million people, receive electricity from private or mixed companies with private capital. Increasing the efficiency of utilities Due to the rapidly changing situation in the housing and communal services market in Germany and in order to achieve competitive advantages, enterprises have begun to pay special attention to modern technologies and automation. Providing a wide range basic and additional services, application various techniques charges, coverage large area services and work with various segments of the population required the use of complex developments capable of supporting all processes in enterprises. The main requirement was the ability modern technologies display the model of housing and communal services before the reform, all changes in the process of reforming the industry and the new market model. The German housing and communal services enterprises had specific goals, namely:

  • The increase in liquidity was ensured through the implementation of an accurate calculation of consumption, control of payments, and rapid receipt of funds.
  • Transparency and efficiency of financial flows at the enterprise were ensured by competent investment planning, financial statements control over the movement of funds.
  • Reducing costs and losses, improving the quality of services provided was ensured by the management of fixed assets, planning repair work and replacement of equipment, control of business processes at the enterprise and beyond.
  • Also, great attention was paid to customer relationships. For this, it was important to maintain a client base, offer various payment schemes and additional services depending on the needs of clients, satisfy their requests, and create a cadastre of land plots.

Achieving these goals largely ensures the success of the enterprise. In order for the reform to proceed at the municipal level, first of all, educational programs were developed and launched, since in the localities, "downstairs", people are little privy to what is being developed "above". Pilot projects were of great importance, demonstrating the benefits of renovating housing - increasing its cost. The continued existence of all communal enterprises was ensured by the fact that the first banks to promote the development of housing and communal services arose. With the help of these banks, and thanks to the appropriate guarantees in case of losses (there was no possibility of securing the loan), the enterprises began to reconstruct the apartments where the tenants continued to live. This was an innovation in the housing sector. Roofs, windows were completely replaced, entrance doors, all plumbing and heating system. The walls of kitchens and bathrooms were covered with tiles, and the facades of buildings were insulated. Only the implemented energy-saving measures (installation of heating substations in buildings, installation of thermostats, insulation of buildings, including windows) brought savings to tenants. There was a decrease in payments from 2.10 DM/m2 of occupied space per month to approximately 1.00 DM/m2. Tenants living in apartments where radiators were equipped with thermostats and heat meters have a new idea of ​​\u200b\u200bexpenses (you only need to pay for what you yourself have consumed). Today, building renovation events in eastern Germany have become commonplace.

Swedes solve communal misunderstandings in Housing Court, and Australians can not pay for water if the apartment does not have a meter

How does the housing and communal services system work in Europe and the USA, South Korea and Brazil, Australia and Turkey? About interesting distinguishing features and conditions for consumers in different countries of the world is our today's material.

Brazil. In this country, different water is used, and it costs, accordingly, in different ways. For example, in some Brazilian prefectures with a centralized water supply system, water is supplied several times a week. It is pumped into underground reservoirs, and water consumption is controlled by metering devices.

Another type of Brazilian water supply is artesian wells. Well water is used for washing and bathing, but it is not drinkable, since in most homes the main sewerage system is cesspools, waste from which seeps into groundwater. The price of Brazilian water depends on the cost of equipment for its delivery and electricity, which is spent on raising and pumping water into tanks.

Gas in Brazil is a scarce fuel. It is supplied to consumers in standard cylinders. Brazilians have to pay for electricity too expensive - up to two dollars per kilowatt.

Consumers from South Korea can use two types district heating- gas and electric. Gas heating it costs more, and the electricity is turned off during the day and not used at all in the summer.

Turkey. Many Turkish houses are equipped solar panels on the rooftops. Behind hot water in Turkey they do not pay, because it is heated by solar energy. Also, for Turkish consumers, there is no concept of "rent", instead of it there is "aydat" - the full cost of servicing a residential complex. "Aidat" is a fixed value, it does not depend on the number of residents. The amount of this fee is set by the residents of the house every year on general meeting, after the manager submits the expense report.

In Australia where fresh water is not enough, many consumers equip their homes with a rainwater collection system. The water collected in this way is used for sanitary needs and watering the garden. Water charges in Australia include the cost of access to the resource and connection to the sewer. Australians pay $150-$200 a month for this alone, and besides, consumers are also charged for cubic meters of water consumed during the month. But if you live in an apartment where water meters are not installed, you do not have to pay for the consumed water: according to Australian law, you cannot charge if there are no meters.

In Sweden, the Housing Court is successfully functioning, dealing with housing and communal troubles.

In the UK, in addition to paying utility bills, consumers also pay a council tax, the amount of which depends on the prestige of the area. Due to the municipal tax and, in part, state budget funds, “purely English” comfort is maintained in the cities of Great Britain, lawns and flower beds are maintained, garbage is taken out, roads are being repaired, and the work of firefighters, police and city officials themselves is paid. Britons living in apartment buildings are required to pay a special home maintenance fee. The owner of the house on these funds maintains elevators, a hall, corridors and adjoining territory.

USA . As soon as a new tenant moves into american house, he concludes a contract for the supply of water, and then a technician from the supply company comes to him and installs a meter. Data from the meter is read automatically and sent to the company without the participation of the consumer. In America, there is virtually no risk of consumer fraud by the management company, since many lawsuits have been filed in the courts in the past on such issues. Thrifty Americans go to court at the slightest suspicion of the possibility of deception.

Interestingly, in the United States, consumers of utility services practically do not pay in cash, preferring to use electronic cards. The amount of payment is withdrawn from the card and transferred to trust accounts. At the same time, the management company can transfer only the balance of money to itself and only after its full settlement with all counterparties.

Management companies (MC) operating in the field of housing and communal services (HCS) today are nothing more than commercialized ZhEKs and DEZs. In other words, private traders, merchants, speculators who have gained access and a legal right to strategically important and vital resources: water, gas, electricity, and heat. Based on Article 13 of Decree of the Government of the Russian Federation No. 354 dated May 6, 2011: “The provision of public services is provided by the managing organization ...”.

Most employees of management companies are not educated, do not know the laws and do not know how to correctly calculate and add up the amounts in receipts for payment for housing and communal services (HCS), therefore, from such a number of amateurs modern system Utilities are bursting at the seams.

It is curious that the management companies themselves do not produce any resources, but they have an exceptional opportunity to trade in strategically important resources, when the resource supplying organizations themselves not only cannot sell their own products: purified or heated water, electricity, gas, heat, but in most cases they cannot even touch the money from the sale of these resources, since, according to the law, all funds must go to the account of the management company., and only after that the management companies decide in what quantity and to which resource supplying organization to transfer money for the resold resources.

It often happens that management companies do not transfer money received from the population from payment for housing and communal services to the accounts of resource supplying organizations: Vodokanal, Heating Systems, Electricity Companies, Gas Services, but withdraw money in an unknown direction and spend it on personal needs - this is a common practice in the work of such companies, because their economic activity is completely out of control.

In such a situation, resource-supplying organizations are sitting without money or are forced to spend their time defending their own interests in court and knocking money out of unscrupulous management companies. Resource-supplying organizations do not receive funds from the sale of communal resources, but they could use this money to repair an outdated fund: change rusted pipes, utilities, modernize the resource-supplying organizations themselves, equipping them with settlement centers, their own accounting department, and the population with individual meters for water, heat, electricity, gas , but everything is arranged in such a way that the UK removes all the cream.

Residents are also dissatisfied with the behavior and service from the management company: utilities are charged and calculated incorrectly, overpriced, without taking into account the formulas and norms of legislation in the field of housing and communal services, recalculation is not carried out, the management company all the time strives to cash in on residents, shortchange, deceive.

It is known from history that in pre-revolutionary Russia urban population, having some income, settled narrow dirty little rooms in tenement houses for a fee. Most of the rooms in tenement houses were deprived of electricity, running water, and sewerage, so instead of electricity, candles burned in the little rooms, latrines were arranged in the courtyard on the street, and water was taken from the nearest river. And already after the final victory of the revolution, a class of beneficiaries and state employees began to emerge in the face of the families of the Red Army, who were exempted from the need to pay rent, unlike all other categories of the population.

Life settled on confiscated square meters, which belonged to the Soviets, was controlled by a division of the Main Directorate of Public Utilities (GUKH), created in 1921 under the NKVD. In 1924, the Central Executive Committee issued a resolution "On housing cooperation", which proposed a form of association of residents in a housing and rental cooperative partnership - ZhAKT. The maintenance of the house was entrusted to JAKT. In the 1930s, RZhU began to develop - district housing departments, which over time retrained into ZhEKs - housing maintenance offices.

ZhEKs were connected with the Ministry of Internal Affairs (passport office), with the Ministry of Defense, which allowed keeping records of recruits, with the Ministry of Culture, organizing cultural events in the local recreation center, with the Ministry of Sports, organizing sports clubs and sports grounds in the yards. ZhEKs were allowed to interfere in the personal lives of residents and monitor their morale, and, if necessary, carry out educational activities for residents through comrades' courts or house committees, which had the right to take measures of public influence against tenants of residential premises and persons living with them who violate the rules use of this space. Therefore, the roots of the boorish attitude towards residents on the part of employees of management companies extend from the time of the revolution, when the housing and communal services system was just beginning to emerge in the country, and the population was in a slavish housing dependence on the authorities.

Under the Soviets, private property was destroyed by everyone possible ways, turning people into a dependent herd: the NKVD had total control over citizens and owned personal information almost everyone, if necessary, could use one or manipulate it for educational purposes. The housing belonged to the state, the Soviets and was rented out, therefore it is the state, it could indicate to whom and how to live, later the system changed a little and housing was given out in turn at the enterprise as if for free, as a kind of gift from the state, for which everyone felt like this state obligated and due, and therefore was forced to obey his will in the face of various state organizations. In the minds of people, the slave psychology and fear of the possibility of losing a roof over their heads and being thrown out into the streets, which originated under the Soviet regime, are still alive, so the population allows itself to be manipulated by illiterate plumbers, technicians, inspectors, judges working in the housing and communal services sector.

In 1989, a resolution “On the transition of housing and communal services to self-financing and self-financing” was adopted, the modern housing and communal services system, in the presence of private ownership of apartments in the country, still remains a relic of the past and requires huge efforts to modernize and normal functioning in society and society in this system.

How does the housing and communal services system work in Europe and the USA, South Korea and Brazil, Australia and Turkey? About interesting distinctive features and conditions for consumers in different countries of the world - our today's material.

Brazil. In this country, different water is used, and it costs, accordingly, in different ways. For example, in some Brazilian prefectures with a centralized water supply system, water is supplied several times a week. It is pumped into underground reservoirs, and water consumption is controlled by metering devices.

Another type of Brazilian water supply is artesian wells. Well water is used for washing and bathing, but it cannot be drunk, as in most homes the main sewage system is cesspools, the waste from which seeps into groundwater. The price of Brazilian water depends on the cost of equipment for its delivery and electricity, which is spent on raising and pumping water into tanks.

Gas in Brazil is a scarce fuel. It is supplied to consumers in standard cylinders and costs (so far) two to three times more than in Ukraine. Brazilians also have to pay a high price for electricity - up to $2 per 1 kilowatt.

Consumers from South Korea can use two types of centralized heating - gas and electric. Gas heating is more expensive, and electric heating is turned off during the day and not used at all in the summer.

Turkey. Many Turkish houses are equipped with solar panels on their roofs. Hot water in Turkey is not paid for, because it is heated by solar energy. Also, for Turkish consumers, there is no concept of "rent", instead of it there is "aydat" - the full cost of servicing a residential complex. "Aidat" is a fixed value, it does not depend on the number of residents. The amount of this fee is set by the residents of the house every year at a general meeting, after the manager submits a report on expenses.

AT australia where fresh water is scarce, many consumers install a rainwater harvesting system in their homes. The water collected in this way is used for sanitary needs and watering the garden. Water charges in Australia include the cost of access to the resource and connection to the sewer. Australians pay $150-200 monthly for this alone, and besides, consumers are also charged for cubic meters of water consumed during the month. But if you live in an apartment where water meters are not installed, you don’t have to pay for the consumed water: according to Australian law, you can’t charge if there are no meters.

Europe. Residents of European countries pay not so much for the water itself, but for drainage. All water that enters the apartment is automatically considered used, regardless of what needs it goes to. That is why all "Euro-sinks" are equipped with a drain plug: in order to save water, Europeans fill a full sink and wash themselves from it.

The public service system in Europe runs on trust. Often, neither the residents of the house nor its owner even know where the meters are and how to take readings from them - all this is done by housing and communal services workers.

AT Sweden The Housing Court is successfully functioning, dealing with housing and communal troubles. AT Great Britain, in addition to paying utility bills, consumers also pay a municipal tax, the amount of which depends on the prestige of the area. Due to the municipal tax and, in part, state budget funds, “purely English” comfort is maintained in the cities of Great Britain, lawns and flower beds are maintained, garbage is taken out, roads are being repaired, and the work of firefighters, police and city officials themselves is paid. Britons living in apartment buildings are required to pay a special home maintenance fee. The owner of the house uses these funds to maintain elevators, a hall, corridors and an adjacent territory.

USA. As soon as a new tenant moves into an American home, he enters into a contract for the supply of water, and then a technician from the supply company comes to him and installs a meter. Data from the meter is read automatically and sent to the company without the participation of the consumer. In America, there is virtually no risk of consumer fraud by the management company, since many lawsuits have been filed in the courts in the past on such issues. Thrifty Americans go to court at the slightest suspicion of the possibility of deception.

Interestingly, in the United States, consumers of utility services practically do not pay in cash, preferring to use electronic cards. The amount of payment is withdrawn from the card and transferred to trust accounts. At the same time, the management company can transfer only the balance of money to itself, and only after its full settlement with all counterparties.

Property tax in the US is paid once a year. The amount of tax is set as a certain percentage of the cost of housing. Penalties for non-payment of this fee are very severe - $ 25-50 for each day of delay. Normal for America are housing costs in the amount of 30% of family income. The cost of maintaining housing and utilities varies in individual states and cities - it depends on many factors: the amount of taxes, the general level of prices, incomes of the population, but climate is fundamental. In areas with hot summers and cold winter electricity for air conditioners is expensive summer time, and in the winter months they pay 30-40% less for electricity, but at the same time, the cost of gas heating increases.