"Scumlord"

[SueDonim]

What does "consistent" mean? Stuff doesn't tell us.
To what extent did it not work? Off once a month, once a week or once a day? Stuff doesn't tell us.

''Sometimes my brakes don't work.''  It doesn't matter how consistent her hot water was, that fact that sometimes she didn't have hot water is the most important.  A basic 21st Century human right in the western world. She needs hot water, end of story.  If your brakes don't work sometimes, it's a very serious problem....sometimes.

Your analogy is not quite the same (faulty brakes can kill you, faulty hotwater is a pain but not lethal) but maybe a car analogy is what people will understand. Many people have been through the situation where the car has a fault, the mechanic thinks it's fixed but it pops up again. And again. In the case of the hot water problem, we do not know what the landlord did to try to remedy it, only that he eventually installed a new one and is in the shit because he wasn't qualified to do that. So evidence of being a smartarse? Or a man at his wits end trying to fix this thing that he can't get a tradie to come to in a timely manner to do what's needed and just wants to get it sorted for his tenant? We don't know because Stuff doesn't tell us.

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I think its blindingly obvious that there are always going to be some ratbag landlords & some ratbag tenants but when landlords are able to easily exploit people to this extent then something needs to change - & quickly.

Yes, there are ratbag landlords and ratbag tenants and there are processes to help both sides when things go wrong. Processes that tend to favour tenants simply because awards are made against people who cannot or will not pay. Exploitation goes both ways but I think overall it is landlords who are exploited more. That's not really relevant to the point I was trying to make about the article --- Stuff does not let the truth get in the way of a good story and these articles should be taken with a grain of salt.