Advice on Good will guest ire for tenants

[Kevin Spence]

I apologise in advance for the long-winded post but just want to over all of the details. I rented my house in October of last year after moving for work last. This is my first time renting and I have a management company in place. The house is a 5 bedroom with pool and spa and we have lawn and pool maintenance included with the lease but utilities excluded. when signing up with the rental company, we asked about leaving the tank that is used for heating the hot-tub and continuing to pay rent for the tenants ($7 a month) and that we would get the company to remove the propane to get our money back (~$400) so that the tenants could fill it if they chose to use it. He advised us to leave it full and let the tenants have the propane as a guest ire of goodwill. About a month or two after the tenants moved in I got a text regarding the heater not working. (They had my phone number after I needed to contact them about picking up a package that was delivered there by mistake). I went through checking everything with them and the conclusion was that the tank was empty. I asked if they'd smelt propane or if they could have left the heater on inadvertently. They said no to both. They've now written a lengthy email to the management company demanding that we refill the tank as they paid extra rent for a the luxury of a heated spa and we should be supplying the propane so they can use the spa and the lease states that we will maintain the pool. We have a company that maintained the chemicals and cleans the pool. The lease specifies that they are responsible for all pool utilities including water to maintain the pool level. The management company has asked if we would like to cover half a tank of propane (~$200) as a guest ire of good will. In the last week we have had three separate call-outs. One for the garage door opener (report said bad sensors but we replaced the whole thing as it was 15 years old), the second for a leak in the water-line for the fridge and finally two of the sliding doors not opening (pretty sure they just need to remove the safety locking pin). I've had about $1200 in repairs in the 5 months that they've been there and am not too pleased about having to chip in another $200 for goodwill after already leaving $400 worth of gas as a goodwill guest ire which has seemed to backfire on me. Any thoughts advice would be greatly welcomed.

[Colleen F.]

If you  provided the first tank that was more then they were entitled to on the lease if they are supposed to pay utilities.  If they would like more hot tub use they have to get it filled. It is 3 months on probably.  If it says they pay pool utilities , they pay all pool utilities.  I would have the tank leak checked at your expense but probably they left it on and even if it leaked there is nothing that says in the lease they were entitled to a full tank right?   

I don't feel like I would want to pay this unless it was explicit in the lease that I had to. Here propane is expensive.  We do have a small 100 lb tank for a fireplace and tell the tenants they can refill it if they want but they are free to use what we have left gratis and we wont expect It filled.  We don't have a service now but when we did we had them switch it to their name. You probably have a 100 gallon tank which is a lot more and service since you have a tank rental.

Think about it, if you left a grill and the tank was full and nothing was stated in the lease would you feel obliged to refill the tank when it was empty?  Tell the PM per the lease it is not an included utility but you will pay the service for a leak check if they insist they did not leave it on.