Grupo-Masa and the ILEGAL electricity scam

Hi Bob Smith, well executed

That's exactly what our builder ( Zapata of Pilar de la Horadada) did to us & hundreds like us. We paid almost 600€ (at the notary on our completion on 20th April, 2005 ) to Zapata to have "provision of water". On the 1st phase (we were the 2nd phase) around the same time we completed, Zapata demanded a large amount from their community for his water !! The community on ph 1 refused to give him more so he cut their water off for three days by which time they couldn't take it any more & they relented & split the cost. 

On our phase there were hardly any owners at the time but two resident owners, who had completed as soon as their sub phase was built, were elected to become the President & Vice president by the handful that had completed by then.
Dave & Alf had seen all that had gone on with phase 1 & knew Zapata would not hesitate to cut our water off too so Dave agreed, on our communties behalf, to pay up, cost was 70€ per property (54 properties) for the year from May 2005. After that payment we had to pay Zapata 40€ per half year till we went onto the mains water in February 2007. The builder's water was paid up till May 2007. Now the plot thickens as we were told by our administrator that the water contract would be paid by Zapata & this did happen. It was 300€ something. So, what happened to the difference between the almost 600€ we paid the builder initially & the water contract's cost of 300€ +, just under 300€ seems to have been left in Zapata's clutches for every owner on our urb & he built hundreds. He also had 70+40+40€ from each of us. I did ask this question on our urb's forum & the only answer I had was "perhaps that difference was for the electricity contract ?" Well, certainly in our case, it wasn't as HCEnergia debited our a/c with almost 300€ in May 2005 for that ! 

It is DAYLIGHT ROBBERY. (Same scenario as you, too !)

So pleased to see that, with the help of EOS forum & Roy, you managed to do a very brave thing.  My husband would be terrified of repercussions. (That's why we have not been to the builder's office to have it out with him. After all, he knows it's illegal but still does it, same as force purchasers to pay him black money. We were forced to pay Zapata almost 50,000€ & our property bwas 195,000€ !!!

These builder are a law unto themselves.


This message was last edited by morerosado on 5/23/2008.

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Congratualtions Bob, sounds like a great result. I hope the message gets passed around and will serve to encourage others to take similar action, and also to make developers think twice about their fraudulent activities and hopefully desist from such behaviour. 

Sheriff: "We completed in Nov 04 and in the last few months have been put on mains electric and water but as yet no Cert of Hab". I'm not certain, and perhaps Roy can offer his opinion, but surely the utilities cannot be connected without the official boletín, which cannot be obtained before the LFO is issued? Are you sure the licence has still not been issued? Maybe it finally has, and nobody bothered to tell you?!

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Normally services, especially electricity, cannot be connected without an LFO being issued

The way to tell is if there is a main fuse installed in the fuse box

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Hi Guys

Thanks for the reply Inspectahomes.  No I am not the RTN Sheriff but another one !!  It is a nickname I picked up years ago involving lots of Rugby and beer etc !!!!

Thanks for your reply. 

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Sheriff, any answer to my query? Do you have your own supply (contract) without the LFO, and if so, how?

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No Roberto we dont have a contract! but MASA are obigated to keep us supplied with Electric and water, until such time as we Have a habitation certificate, or 4 years , then we sue them for not completing on the contract

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Up to date news! Costa Almeria news are going to publicise this for us , including passing on the message to their Spanish newspaper colleagues.on the local front The Camposol Courier  (Camposol Residents association) are going to feature this story, in the Courier due out 1st June. The more the merrier

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My question about contracts and LFO's was for Sheriff (see his posts below) but congratualtions on your result again, and I'm glad to hear it's going to get the publicity it merits.

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Hi Roberto 

Apologies for not getting back to you sooner.  To be honest I am not very technically minded but do know that an electrician for/representing Iberdrola came round and played with some wires in the fuse box in the house.  Some Iberdrola guys came to the Urb one day and went to everyone's house who was there - my fantastic neighbours only called me when they had finished so I had to wait 4 weeks (and a lot of stress) to get connected !!.   We also receive an electronic bill from Ibredrola via the Internet (by the way my wife set this up on the Iberdrola website and we can access our bill electronically which is great for people who do not get Correos !!!).

I guess this means that the LFO must have been issued at some time but I have not seen it !!??  Shame - thought I could sue the builder after 4 years due ot no LFO and get my money back !!!

Dream on !!!

Thanks for all your valuable advice and good luck ot the guys re Masa etc. 

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Check very carefully with regard to Iberdrola!!
Last year they got huge unwanted publicity for connecting up houses without habitataion certificates!
It was front page news on Costa Blanca News,
On Camposol we receive water bills from Agualia, only when people tried to pay the water bills, Agualia told them not to pay as they "knew nothing " about these bills.
when questioned about the Agualia logos on the bills, they said MASA and Agualia use the same printing company, Camposol splits into A B C & D, Agualia only Charge people on sector A, Masa charge the rest! Lots of people on Camposol get bills from Iberdrola, NONE OF US HAVE HABITATION CERTIFICATES !thats 7000 houses

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The publicity on this will be really good news and it just proves that as I advised it is ilegal to charge for builders supply and more people should complain but I understand the concerns over recrimination by the builders

In my line of work I get plenty of threats form the developers and I have had 3 report me to the tax people on the basis that they tried to claim that I was not registered as a legal company or paying tax and NI, I am and I was able to prove this.

Another large company tried to query my qualifications to carry out the survey, again no problem here but they have tried everything to stop us inspecting properties , one now require a notarised written POA if the owner is not presnt at the inspection, perhaps they are they trying to hide something

MASA specifically will not allow third parties to inspect unless the owner is present for the snagging inspection resukting in additional cost and lost time to the buyer

In my own case I have today received The Certificate of Habitation for my own property in Villamartin so I have a meeting with the lawyer later to see how I stand

Again great news and I look forward to reading the press

I have produced a  free Q&A guide that explains your rights and covers this area  and all of the question you should be asking a developer, before you complete, and if anybody would like a copy please e-mail me at qaguide@inspectahomespain.com

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Have been very interested to read all the comments on this thread. We live on another Grupo Masa development at Sierra Golf and have been here since Dec. 07 when we finally had our elect connected by Iberdrola, having lost our builders supply for about 6 weeks ( for this 6 weeks about 20 of us were given free accom. by Masa at their Hotel ) We still are on bldrs supply for water .

The thing which interests me now is although we have elect meters and are paying Iberdrola in the normal way ( we have proper bills) we still do NOT have our Habitation Certs.

Roy has stated that it is not possible to have utilities connected without LFO's being issued. Ours has definately not been issued  -- the building phases here are a bit different to Camposol and are done by Poligono No's . The only LFO's that have been issued to my knowledgs are for  no. 13 - we are on no. 15.

All very odd !! Can anyone cast any light on this ?

PS. Is the Miguel the same Miguel who is the site manager at Sierra Golf ?

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I have dealt with thousands of properties and even had this problem with my own property and always it has not been possible to get the elctrical connection form the mains supplier without a valid LFO

Please ask your lawyer in this case how it is that you have a connection

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Latest  news :- Headline from Costa Almeria News (FRONT PAGE this friday)
CAMPOSOL SITE MANAGER BLOWS A FUSE. 

sub heading EXPATS ACCUSEHAMMER-WIELDING CONSTRUCTION EMPLOYEE OF THREATS

to date more than 30 denuncias have made, with many more to follow

We have heard from people in Alicante, that MASA are doing exactly the same tactics on the Serena Golf  urbanisation
we would urge them to follow the steps we have taken

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Hi,

Have been reading the e mails about Grupo-Masa and the illegal electricity scam, fascinating but sad that buying a property in Spain is so fraught with difficulties.  I have been waiting to sign for my property since December 2007, the property is finished, I visited it in December but the developer Idearco would not make an appointment to sign, when he finally did, sent in the administrator the day before and has after a large amount of publicity cleared the site, the road has been made up.   The administrator seems very effective but the builder has informed my lawyer that he will not be signing off any more apartments until he has the building licence.   I understand that even though he has 45,000 euros of my money, should he go bankrupt or seek protection from creditors I will be an unsecured creditor and lose the money I have paid so far.  I like the other purchasers feel angry and helpless.  Has anyone any ideas as to whether there are any steps which we can take to move this process along.  At the moment I just feel like giving up.

Safia

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Hi,

Have been reading the e mails about Grupo-Masa and the illegal electricity scam, fascinating but sad that buying a property in Spain is so fraught with difficulties.  I have been waiting to sign for my property since December 2007, the property is finished, I visited it in December but the developer Idearco would not make an appointment to sign, when he finally did, sent in the administrator the day before and has after a large amount of publicity cleared the site, the road has been made up.   The administrator seems very effective but the builder has informed my lawyer that he will not be signing off any more apartments until he has the building licence.   I understand that even though he has 45,000 euros of my money, should he go bankrupt or seek protection from creditors I will be an unsecured creditor and lose the money I have paid so far.  I like the other purchasers feel angry and helpless.  Has anyone any ideas as to whether there are any steps which we can take to move this process along.  At the moment I just feel like giving up.

Safia

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I spoke with our interepeter today,  (Fiona Green) she told me she had received a phone call from a lady on Camposol, who had her electricity cut off, Fiona advised her to go to MASAs office and inform them, that as denuncias had been laid with the guardia, unless they immediately restored her electric, she was going to the guardia to had her name to the list!   When she returned home, the electric had been restored. Our biggest worry was that had we been cut off, how long would it take to get it restored??
Well now we know!!

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Hi Inspectahomespain,
I have been lookin at some of your previous posts where you say it is
illegal to be charged for water or electric while on builders supply.
This is my situation-
Our apartment block has not got the LFO yet, we are still on builders supply
for electric BUT have been getting water bills for the last year from
Aguagest, could you tell me is this correct.?
If not what are my options.!

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I have the same situation with my apartment and I have established that, for water supply from Agualest, with the proviso that the buider can prove he has applied for the LFO, where the water supply is connected, and where the technical bolletin is available, it is possible to for the builder to get the water meters fitted and charged to the customer

The other proviso is that the builder has settled any outstanding bill for water with the supplier and there is some form of waiver that allows this

For electricty there is no way that connections can be made without the LFO

I know that it is confusing but the conditions seem to vary by supplier and area

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TO INSPECTAHOMESPAIN,
Thanks very much for the info, it is really
appreciated.Just wish now we had mains
electric and LFO.

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