Job Discussion Forums

[Long ai gu]

For all that know, how much are you paying for utility bills and what exactly are the utilities? EG: water, electricity, gas- etc.

[TEAM_PAPUA]

Nothing - my company pay mine as the company own the housing in which we live.


T_P

[lily]

the only things my bf and I pay for is:
gas for hot water Y76 / 6-8 weeks
international phone calls - fair enought really

everything else our school pays for - electricity, phone lines, internet (to a certain point, but we've never passes that point), water...

Lily

[TEAM_PAPUA]

However, when I worked for English Thirst up in 'Spitsville' we had to pay for the winter heating. Now this thing comes on in the entire block whether you want it or not & there is a one-off payment: supposedly around 2000rmb for the winter months. So we were paying (in a shared apartment) around 500rmb per month each.

This was obviously a con of the highest order. More money for the boss's KTV girlies I expect.

T_P

[ContemporaryDog]

Christ, what a con, TP.

I don't have any bills here at my school. They even pay phone calls within China.

When i first got the school info it said that all the bills except internet would be paid, and that we would have to pay 50 yuan per month for internet connection. That fee has never actually been asked for. I think they realised that with the internet connection going down a lot, it would be a bit rich to ask for a fee.

(One of my colleagues last year, stupidly, got to the school and thought we were being charged for internet use on a per-minute basis, so after using it for the first time he pressed 'disconnect'. He then had to wait ages for the chronically-inefficient IT department to get their arses in gear and come round to fix it )

[lagerlout2006]

I am also curious so I hope that some who are paying answer.

I pay but it's subsidized so I pay the amount over 200 each month. Bill comes every 2 months. For July August it was a whopping 1400 RMB. For the last months (little heat or AC) it's less than 600 -TOTAL I mean and this includes water bill...School say it's .4 a KW--sorry for the technical jargon...

PS I have no idea if the school are marking up the actual---I tend to think they are.

[voodikon]

i'm supposed to be paying but i haven't gotten a bill yet. it apparently comes through the landlord. my roommates assure me that it's "cheap," but i'm keeping some savings just incase they hit me with a bill that's equal to two months' rent or something.

i'll keep you posted as i find out.

[Roger]

Every place I worked at provided me with:
- one cylinder of gas free (but follow-up orders had to be paid for by myself);
- local phone calls (except those training centres I worked for);
currently I even have long-distance phone calls for free;
- food (lunch and/or dinner); in some schools it was subsidised;
my current employer is stingy. Nothing for free.
- Internet for free;
- use of copier and printer: always free, though my present employer
has recently changed the policy: we buy ink cartridges at our expense!
That hurts because if we print out any materials for our learners
then we print out a lot of things at a lot of cost to us!
- transport: shopping trips have always been part of the deal though not
here; in our university I have to take the bus for work-related commutes
and the bus schedule is strict and unflexible. If you miss the busor if
it is full, you have the choice of travelling by taxi at your expense!
- No school has ever offered me, or if they have offered, they haven't
lived up to their offer of free Chinese lessons!

[ContemporaryDog]

At my school I have to go to the school's branch school in the morning. I have to get the school minibus there, if I miss it I have to pay the taxi fare myself. But at the end of the morning I get a taxi and the school pays me back for it, which isn't too bad.

Printing is free, although its sometimes a hassle getting access to the printer...

[brsmith15]

I have my own place here in the Big Apple of China. Two bedrooms. About 110 sq. M.

Electricity: 100 - 500 RMB. Highest in August, lowest in October.
Water: 20 RMB
Gas: 30 RMB (used for heating water and cooking)
Internet: 35 RMB
Phone: 80

Right now my average total cost of utilities is 300 a month.

[vdrose]

normally the school pay for all the bills,with my experience all the bills and even my mineral water is even provided by the school

br

[Giantbudwiser]

Well I pay 6500 for rent and average around 3-500 for utilities but then again I am not a teacher so don�t know but when I was a teachers before I had the school pay for everything.

[tarzaninchina]

All employers I've known will cough up gas, water, and electricity. You know they're dodgy if they don't, or at the least you can expect pay problems.

Aside from that, it seems you gotta negotiate for phone bills and internet access.

[kev7161]

Water: 0 rmb
Drinking Water: 0 rmb
Propane gas: first tank (within contracted year) - free, after that 50rmb per (but I barely used one within a year's time)
Internet: 0 rmb
Phone service: 0 rmb (I buy my own phone cards though)
Electricity: 200-300 units per month (depending on the month) - free. After that, it is .70rmb per unit used.
Cable: 0 rmb (but I rarely use my cable thanks to having . . . SATELLITE!)

I may whine about not having enough money (well, that is one of the things I RARELY whine about!), but if I was back home, I'd be paying big bucks for all those things above, not to mention rent! It's a decent little package.

[deezy]

TP....you and me both! I am totally p**d off at the moment as I've just had to fork out 1500 for 4 months heating, one of which I won't need as I shall be back in Australia, but they can't 'switch it off' as it's for the whole block. And we got two days warning. I was so furious I wrote a kneejerk email to my CM but there's not much she can do....it's just we never got told about these costs before we (that's all the EF staff) signed contracts etc..

And now my apartment is so hot I have to leave the windows open......