Peckham: Communal heating now £4K per year each, say leaseholders

Leaseholders, who always have to pay the actual cost of their estate’s heating within a financial year, say they are struggling under huge yearly bill increases and believe it would be cheaper to have an individual boiler.

Emily Miller, 40, who bought a two-bedroom flat on Peckham’s Consort Estate in 2014, said her annual service charge bill had gone up from £1,800 a decade ago to over £4,500 this year, mainly due to a surging heating and hot water charge.

She said: “Being leaseholders, we are totally trapped in. Initially, I took it on the chin but the bills seem to have rocketed in the past few years.

“The flats are so warm as it is, we only have the heating on four times a year. This year I had to buy a stand-alone air conditioning unit. It was £450 and it uses lots of electricity and the electricity isn’t covered by the service charge.”