With the days of the Internet upon us, things are becoming easier by the click.
While there are many students who live in dorms and on-campus housing, there is also a chunk of students who live in off-campus apartments.
Among those students who buy services from the Knoxville Utilities Board (KUB), some find that they are paying for months they are not actually using.
“I mean, it’s not anyone’s fault,” Brittany Doss, junior in nursing, said. “It just kind of is what it is. When you sign on to a lot of these apartment leases, you know ahead of time that you are in a 12-month lease, and you’re paying for all those regardless if you’re there or not.”
However, even though students will be paying for rent with 12-month leases, they can stop paying their KUB bill with a click of a mouse.
On KUB’s website, there is a “Start/Stop Service” tab, which allows users to start or stop their residential utility services at any time. All that’s necessary is one’s account number, billing zip code and an ID number.
Students such as Josh Delaney, sophomore in communications studies, like this idea because he feels like he would definitely use that feature to its fullest potential.
“I personally like it, because for instance, in the summer, I probably won’t be here much and I think it’s beneficial to get on the website and discontinue the utilities just to save money,” Delaney said.
Justin Schoonmaker, junior in journalism and electronic media, lives in the Woodlands Apartments, but he’s from Knoxville, so in the summer he may not be on campus as much.
“I think it’s good for the fact that a lot of college students don’t live here so we are going to need this place to live for nine months of the year,” Schoonmaker said. “But they only offer 12-month leases, so there’s going to be a 3-month period where we are not going to be here, or not going to be here as much, and where we don’t want to pay for something we are not using, so it would be good to stop the pay for those months.”
Neither Delaney nor Schoonmaker knew about the feature that KUB offered online, but both said they intend to use it once summer comes around.
Doss also said that it’s going to be a big help since she handles most of the utilities in the apartment.
“I’m the one that gets the bill and so in the summer, while I’m not here, it’ll be nice to just be able to cut off KUB for three months and to not be getting the bills that we usually get” Doss said.
Doss also said that more students would probably like to know about the KUB’s “Start/Stop Service” feature before the summer starts.
“If more people knew about it, or if they had some way of letting people know about it upfront, that’d definitely be a good thing,” Doss said. “I know once summer starts, paying a bill you may not be using is going to be the last thing that you want to do.”
