Shared bills in student houses - any experience of ‘bunch’ etc?

[bigmarrowlegs]

Hi DD gets keys for her student flat for next year in a few weeks. We’re trying to work out what to do about bills - she got quotes for bill packages from ‘bunch’ but they seemed really high. Did seem very convenient though.

I think it might be much cheaper to just go to the power / broadband providers direct. There are only 2 of them sharing. Anybody had experience of this for advice?

ta

Never heard of bunch. Never had any problems just splitting the bills.

If there's just the two of them, it would be best for them to split who takes care of which bill. This gives each an incentive to pay the other, or if there is a problem, at least one person isn't left having to pay it all out of their pocket until such time as they are hopefully reimbursed for the other person's share. You can't split it up entirely fairly (gas/electricity is always going to be a lot more than internet) but at least it's something.

My daughter and her friends did a lot of research into this and the bill splitting services, unsurprisingly, were way more expensive. To the extent they would be paying hundreds of pounds more over the year. It's a pain organising everything to start off, but worth it in the long run. With just 2 sharing it will be slightly easier.

DS and his housemates used Huddle rather than Bunch - might be worth doing a quick comparison across the two.

Disclaimer - I had nothing to do with the decision, they all worked it out themselves and it seemed to go OK. Just make very sure someone has done meter readings on the day they move in, and photograph them, don't believe for an instant the students moving out will have remembered to do it/won't argue the toss.

Ds and his flatmates found it was cheaper to go with individual bills. One person has taken responsibility for each bill, and they use an app (Splitwise) to work out who owes what.

They add other things to the app as well - eg shared groceries, takeaways

Agree with others. Splitting who takes responsibility for each bill has worked well for my DD and her flatmate.

DS has done individual bills, which worked out cheaper. Energy costs are the bulk of it and they are the same wherever you go these days. The broadband in the Bunch package wasn’t as good as what they sourced themselves.

I think all my kids used one called 'Glide'.It is front-loaded inthey pay a bit more in (obviously the co has to make a profit) but they got a lump out at the end.
I would very very strongly advocate it.Some students never seem to have any money,people fall out, others have no sense of responsibility you don't want your child to be the one left holding the baby!