Complaints

The complaint text that is displayed might not represent all complaints filed with BBB. Some consumers may elect to not publish the details of their complaints, some complaints may not meet BBB's standards for publication, or BBB may display a portion of complaints when a high volume is received for a particular business.

• Initial Complaint

  Date:03/20/2025

  Type:Customer Service Issues
  Status:

  AnsweredMore info

  Complaint statuses

  Resolved:

  The complainant verified the issue was resolved to their satisfaction.

  Unresolved:

  The business responded to the dispute but failed to make a good faith effort to resolve it.

  Answered:

  The business addressed the issues within the complaint, but the consumer either a) did not accept the response, OR b) did not notify BBB as to their satisfaction.

  Unanswered:

  The business failed to respond to the dispute.

  Unpursuable:

  BBB is unable to locate the business.

  *** (****************************) charges on your electricity bill are for the clean energy that they purchase on behalf of their customers. These charges represent about 1/3 of the total bill and reflect the specific energy option selected by the customer, such as 100% ************************* or Lean Power12. *** is a community-driven organization that believes in a clean energy future. LIVABLE of ******** **********. PO BOX ****** is charging that 1/3 of my total Electric bill. 18.22$ I think this is an illegitimate charge.

  Business Response

  Date: 03/20/2025

  Hi *******,

  I understand your concern with having accurate charges on your bill.

  The best route to get these issues solved is to reach out to our customer support team so they can properly investigate the billing on your account.

  They can be reached Monday-Friday from 6am-5pm PST. At ************************************************************.

  I will share your information with them and have someone reach out after they have done an audit on your concern.

  Thanks,

  Livable Team

• Initial Complaint

  Date:07/10/2023

  Type:Service or Repair Issues
  Status:

  AnsweredMore info

  Complaint statuses

  Resolved:

  The complainant verified the issue was resolved to their satisfaction.

  Unresolved:

  The business responded to the dispute but failed to make a good faith effort to resolve it.

  Answered:

  The business addressed the issues within the complaint, but the consumer either a) did not accept the response, OR b) did not notify BBB as to their satisfaction.

  Unanswered:

  The business failed to respond to the dispute.

  Unpursuable:

  BBB is unable to locate the business.

  As everyone else mentioned, this company is a SCAM!! I requested a payment plan and EXPLAINED that my roommate/sister LOST HER JOB and we were having issues paying. They gave me an ASTRONOMICAL amount of $150 plus the month's bill. I said I CAN NOT AFFORD it and they had NO EMPATHY as if we aren't in a pandemic PLUS inflation PLUS MY SISTER LOST HER JOB!!!All in all, I never responded and they didnt BUT 5 days later we paid HALF of the past due amount. But NOW I am receiving phone calls from a collection agency. So they never even implement the payment plan and they just CASHING OUT ON INNOCENT PEOPLE. It's not on my credit report BUT I want to ensure I WILL NOT be penalized because If I am then I WILL NEVER pay Livable and continue to go through the collection agency IF they DID get me. Especially as a Haitian woman, they are endangering my livelihood because my apartment threatened to evict me AND now if they have this placed on my credit, it now denies me a lot of access plus bring my score down after I worked SO HARD to get it to where it is at. I am being discriminated and harassed from a company that EYE NEVER signed up for. I PRAY THEY GO BANKRUPT BECAUSE GOD DOES NOT LIKE UGLY AND GOD DOES NOT PLAY ABOUT ME. GOD GOT ME AND I CAN'T WAIT TO SEE THEIR KARMA. EVERYONE HATES YOUR COMPANY.

  Customer Answer

  Date: 07/10/2023

  Thank you, *****. My name is ******************************** 

  Business Response

  Date: 07/10/2023

  Hi *******,

  I'm sorry if you felt the team wasn't empathizing with your situation. We definitely work to instill that in the way the team interacts with residents in difficult situations. Unfortunately, as you can imagine, we get alot of these types of calls/emails from residents and Livable does not have the authority to make changes to your account without approval from the Property Manager/Owner. We are contracted with your management company and ultimately they have to sign off on everything as they were the ones that implemented the program. We are simply facilitating the billing process.

  If you would like to discuss this directly with your housing provider, we can set up any type of payment plan that they approve. They just have to let us know that directly in writing.

  In addition, Livable does not currently do any reporting to credit bureaus or send residents to 3rd party collections. We have an internal collections department that reaches out to delinquent residents in effort to encourage payment but that would not affect your credit score. That being said, your housing provider may choose to send any overdue balance to collections on their own.

  Let us know if you have any further questions or need additional assistance.

  Thanks,

  Livable Support

   

  Customer Answer

  Date: 07/13/2023

   
  Complaint: 20295593
  
  I am rejecting this response because: I already paid half. 
  
  Sincerely,
  
  *******************************

  Business Response

  Date: 07/14/2023

  Hi *******,

  Ok, sounds good. Then it appears there is no action needed from us at this time.

  Thanks,

  Livable Support

• Initial Complaint

  Date:05/12/2023

  Type:Billing Issues
  Status:

  AnsweredMore info

  Complaint statuses

  Resolved:

  The complainant verified the issue was resolved to their satisfaction.

  Unresolved:

  The business responded to the dispute but failed to make a good faith effort to resolve it.

  Answered:

  The business addressed the issues within the complaint, but the consumer either a) did not accept the response, OR b) did not notify BBB as to their satisfaction.

  Unanswered:

  The business failed to respond to the dispute.

  Unpursuable:

  BBB is unable to locate the business.

  I've been trying to reach Livable and only gotten generic email responses. First off why do they not have a customer service number to reach at? Also my bill at my apartment for utilities has mysterious late charges even though we paid our bills on time and last months payment was not calculated so that this months bill shows 2 months of unpaid utilities charges. This company's billing makes no sense and I cannot get in contact with someone at this shady company to figure out what is going on. I'm not sure what is going on but this company does not seem professional or well run and I've worked with other management company's before.

  Business Response

  Date: 05/12/2023

  Our customer support phone number is *************. This number is listed on the paper invitations a resident recieves when they enroll in our program. They also receive an electronic invite via email to our online portal which also lists our customer support phone number. 

  This resident is receiving paper billing statements in the mail each month, which also lists our customer support number. The resident also has accepted electronic access to our online billing portal. There is a chat widget displayed there for them to request a call back from our customer support team.

  This resident does not have double charges on their account for last month or any recent month. They are being billed for 2 separate utilites Water/Sewer and Trash. So they will see 2 line items that list those utilities and the amount due.

  The resident has been receiving late fees because their account has been carrying an overdue balance each month. Once they pay their balance in full, they will not receive a late fee as long as they submit their payment to ** before the 21st of each month.

• Initial Complaint

  Date:04/14/2023

  Type:Billing Issues
  Status:

  AnsweredMore info

  Complaint statuses

  Resolved:

  The complainant verified the issue was resolved to their satisfaction.

  Unresolved:

  The business responded to the dispute but failed to make a good faith effort to resolve it.

  Answered:

  The business addressed the issues within the complaint, but the consumer either a) did not accept the response, OR b) did not notify BBB as to their satisfaction.

  Unanswered:

  The business failed to respond to the dispute.

  Unpursuable:

  BBB is unable to locate the business.

  They are scamming tenants by misleading rent-controlled (and really any current-lease tenants) into thinking they have to pay extra fees that are not part of the lease agreement. everyone in my rent-controlled building was sent the following email. we did not pay for utilities to our landlord/property management/any third part previously. Garbage, sewer, and water is included in our lease with no aditional fees and we pay for electricity for our units individually and do not pay for community areas' utilities seperately, just what we pay in our fixed rent. In **********, extra fees like this cannot be charge to rent control tenants and changes to the terms of a lease (even for non-rent control tenants) like this cannot be made. They are trying to make it look like we must pay this and that they can legitimately bill this when they cannot. They must know this is illegal: The purpose of this email is to inform and provide a 60-day notice that Ownership will update the terms and conditions of your Lease Agreement with the enclosed Livable Utility Addendum that will become effective on June 15, 2023. The Livable Utility Addendum is method of allocating proportional monthly utility expenses to residents of a multifamily apartment building. Utility expenses, such as Water, Garbage and Sewer, are calculated by several factors including but not limited to, the number of residents per unit and size of the unit. Should you have any questions about this Utility Addendum, please contact Livable, *** at ************** or ********************************** Upon your final review of the enclosed Addendum, please sign and return to our office as soon as possible. You may return your signed addendum By the way, their main headquarters are at **************************************************************** which BBB and the ** AG have collected many reports of scams from.

  Business Response

  Date: 04/24/2023

  Hello,

  We are a third party billing provider. We work with Property Owners and Property Managers to bill their residents back for their utility usage. While we do our best to provide guidance on local regulations, at the end of the day, it is the responsibility of the person managing that property to ensure they are in compliance. If they inform us that they have followed all requirements for their local jurisdiction, we have no way to confirm or deny that. Each property owner or manager may have different agreements with their residents in addition to the varying regulations for their area.

  In summary, we are contracted with property owners and property managers to provide billing services for their residents. Any concerns regarding the adherance to local regulations around if their residents can be billed for these services is the responsibility of the client, not Livable.

   

  Customer Answer

  Date: 04/24/2023

   
  Complaint: 19934777
  
  I am rejecting this response because:

  While it is true that the property management company and in turn the landlord must also follow the law (and I will take note that you blamed full legal liability on them in future dealings involving them on this matter), Livable *** also bears responsibility, especially if they are drafting letters and emails about this scheme for the property management to send out. So did you draft the main text/content of the letter and email they sent out? And I would also say that thinking up and marketing such clearly illegal schemes to landlords and property managers also means you hold responsibility along with the property managers who employ you in carrying out these illegal schemes. 

  Also you say it is only the property manager's responsibility to follow "local laws" (which, again, I disagree with - everyone must follow the law, even you! You are not above the law!); but also, Federal laws were violated too, such as FTC's CAN-SPAM law and federal mail fraud law, as well as federally-accepted contract law. So are you trying to claim that you are also above Federal law? Also state laws were violated; I'm not sure if by "local" you mean entire state law or not, but just clarifying that point... 

  
  Sincerely,
  
  J S

  Business Response

  Date: 04/24/2023

  You are correct, our agreement idemnifies us from issues related to actions taken by our clients to implement this program at their properties. We are not implying that we are above any laws. As I stated previously, we are simply providing a billing program that your property manager chose to implement at your building.

  The point is that we can only provide general guidance to our clients about what laws may pertain to the implementation of this program at their property, it is ultimaltly at their own discretion to implement this program or not.

  It appears that the communication you received regarding the 60 day notice in change of terms was written and distributed by your property managment. That is not something that we generated or wrote for them. Notice regarding change of tenancy terms will always come from the property managment. Once the client enrolls a resident in our platform, we simply send out generic information about how the program works and instructions on how to pay your bills. Then we send monthly billing statements.

  Again, our company offers a utility billing solution to property owners and managers. If your property management was billing you for your utility usage via Quickbooks, you would not complain to the BBB about Quickbooks.

• Initial Complaint

  Date:03/28/2023

  Type:Sales and Advertising Issues
  Status:

  AnsweredMore info

  Complaint statuses

  Resolved:

  The complainant verified the issue was resolved to their satisfaction.

  Unresolved:

  The business responded to the dispute but failed to make a good faith effort to resolve it.

  Answered:

  The business addressed the issues within the complaint, but the consumer either a) did not accept the response, OR b) did not notify BBB as to their satisfaction.

  Unanswered:

  The business failed to respond to the dispute.

  Unpursuable:

  BBB is unable to locate the business.

  I had a utility billing account with ******************** and needed the account transferred when I was moving out. I followed the instructions to email them and received confirmation that the account was transferred to the new tenant. My account has since been disabled. The new tenant then set up a new account and had access to my bank information and accidentally paid their new bill with my banking account information that Livable provided to them. The new tenant contacted me and I have contacted Livable. They said they would send me a check and delete my bank information. I am seeking further action for their misconduct. Livable said "will never remove a tenant's banking details" from the account, but my account was disabled and my bank information was transferred to the new tenants account. However there was no possible way for me to remove a payment mechanism from my account without it being replaced with a new one and my account has since been disabled because I am no longer a tenant there.

  Business Response

  Date: 04/17/2023

  Our system does not allow for separate accounts for roommates. Typically one person will manage the account and pay the bill and the others will reimburse them for their share. When 1 roommate moves out, we simply update the contact information upon request. We would have no way to determine who the payment method on file is owned by. The residents have the ability to add/remove payment methods, so we would assume that if the person leaving is the one who had attached their bank account, that they would have the other roomate add their payment info once the other one had moved out.

  We would have no way to "share" payment information between separate accounts. We do not have access to the payment information in order to be able to reenter it on a different account. 

• Initial Complaint

  Date:03/06/2023

  Type:Billing Issues
  Status:

  UnansweredMore info

  Complaint statuses

  Resolved:

  The complainant verified the issue was resolved to their satisfaction.

  Unresolved:

  The business responded to the dispute but failed to make a good faith effort to resolve it.

  Answered:

  The business addressed the issues within the complaint, but the consumer either a) did not accept the response, OR b) did not notify BBB as to their satisfaction.

  Unanswered:

  The business failed to respond to the dispute.

  Unpursuable:

  BBB is unable to locate the business.

  Livable contracts with **************, a property management company for property owner ** MULTIFAMILY V PROPERTY OWNER LLC. I've been unable to ascertain through the ********** Secretary of State's business records whether or not Livable is legally registered with the right to operate as a business in **********. Livable's website advertises itself as offering "custom utility management and cost recovery solutions for commercial and residential properties." I suspect Livable is engaging in fraudulent accounting practices, potentially in concert with ******************* and the property owner. Either through incompetence or deliberate intent, Livable and ************** appear to be overcharging or double and triple charging tenants for pass-throughs. I suspect this tactic is the property owner's disingenuous method of circumventing rent-control laws in ************* to extract additional monthly money out of tenants. For instance, I've now paid for '"December charges" three times: once in December, once in January, and again for February. No clarification or explanation is provided as to how or why they are still collecting charges for December. This gradual price-gouging has been going on for at least a year now via Livable's invoicing. Contacting Livable and ************** has yielded evasive and vague responses, and a refusal to provide an invoice detailing more specifics for clarity. I've also registered a complaint against property owner and **************.