It's been a while since I wrote about our home away from home on Gruzinski val, Belorusskaya station, Moscow and there are some pretty good reasons for that I figure. But since most everyone in Moscow is currently having to deal with the change out of electrical meters demanded by Mosenergo let me give you a heads up that may save you a ton of heart ache! Surprising no one I am sure I suspect there is the possibility of a scam here (there is no such thing as paranoia in Moscow!) but reality dictates that it is too sweet an opportunity for there to not be a scam against all property owners who may be spending most of their time outside of the country and therefore not be in a position to deal with issues in person.
It works thusly:
Mosenergo gives you a notice that your flats electrical meter is old and needs to be replaced. This is a normal enough request so you make an appointment and the deed is eventually done. It's not quite that simple but if you have ever lived in Moscow there is no need for me to fill in the gaps.
So you ask the service tech what to do with the old meter and he says to bin it as he is required to report the old readings to the head office and billing will smoothly transition to the new meter all nice like! With no problems whatsoever. My antenna should have been up and twitching right about then.
So like an idiot you throw out the old meter and the service tech promptly gets a decimal point out of sequence and you now owe Mosenergo 12 billion rubles and having left the city you call from a foreign area code to attempt to smooth the situation and are told with rank hostility that if you don't pay it by next week the word goes out to the border police (a department of the FSB) and the next time you visit the country your passport will be confisgated and you can't leave. Until you pay seventy billion rubles, because penalties and all!
So eventually with many phone calls to the original service tech who suddenly has no record of ever having met you you are suddenly the proud owner of a burnt out Lada and a clean electrical bill. The end.
Well, what did you expect?
The fact is that Moscow authorities do not actually descriminate against foriegners as far as I am aware. They treat everyone like dirt. But that bit about being prevented from traveling out of the country if you have an outstanding debt is perfectly true and I am sure the fact is used by anyone who is trying to settle an account whether it is a legitimate charge or not.
It seems to me that unless you are filthy rich or friends of some really ugly people owning property is just a huge hassle. If it isn't nasty neighbors then it's self-important officials looking to have something to produce for their next peer evaluation with the boss. But renting has it's own pitfalls as I am sure we all know.
I remember a line from a William S. Burroughs story where to get rich was to get cured and man am I ever in need of a cure!
It works thusly:
Mosenergo gives you a notice that your flats electrical meter is old and needs to be replaced. This is a normal enough request so you make an appointment and the deed is eventually done. It's not quite that simple but if you have ever lived in Moscow there is no need for me to fill in the gaps.
So you ask the service tech what to do with the old meter and he says to bin it as he is required to report the old readings to the head office and billing will smoothly transition to the new meter all nice like! With no problems whatsoever. My antenna should have been up and twitching right about then.
So like an idiot you throw out the old meter and the service tech promptly gets a decimal point out of sequence and you now owe Mosenergo 12 billion rubles and having left the city you call from a foreign area code to attempt to smooth the situation and are told with rank hostility that if you don't pay it by next week the word goes out to the border police (a department of the FSB) and the next time you visit the country your passport will be confisgated and you can't leave. Until you pay seventy billion rubles, because penalties and all!
So eventually with many phone calls to the original service tech who suddenly has no record of ever having met you you are suddenly the proud owner of a burnt out Lada and a clean electrical bill. The end.
Well, what did you expect?
The fact is that Moscow authorities do not actually descriminate against foriegners as far as I am aware. They treat everyone like dirt. But that bit about being prevented from traveling out of the country if you have an outstanding debt is perfectly true and I am sure the fact is used by anyone who is trying to settle an account whether it is a legitimate charge or not.
It seems to me that unless you are filthy rich or friends of some really ugly people owning property is just a huge hassle. If it isn't nasty neighbors then it's self-important officials looking to have something to produce for their next peer evaluation with the boss. But renting has it's own pitfalls as I am sure we all know.
I remember a line from a William S. Burroughs story where to get rich was to get cured and man am I ever in need of a cure!
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