Reader question: How do I get from the annual statement to verifiable individual vouchers?
The annual settlement lists water, insurance and building maintenance with total amounts. You can check that the column has been added up correctly. What was actually charged, however, cannot yet be verified without vouchers. For that you need concrete access to the underlying documents.
Confirm the presented settlement method
This article concerns the annual flat-rate settlement under § 21 paragraph 3 MRG in the applicable scope. It is not a general statement about all Austrian tenancy agreements. § 1 and the specific cost agreement therefore belong to the initial documents. [MRG1]
§ 21 paragraph 3 requires the settlement at the latest by 30 June of the following year, its posting in a suitable place in the building and suitable inspection of the vouchers. For vouchers on data carriers it specifies inspection of printouts. On request, copies or photocopies or further printouts are to be produced at the expense of the requesting tenant party. [MRG21]
Name precisely the desired inspection
Our editorial recommendation: specify the property, settlement year and the documents you already have. Ask for the location, contact and a genuinely possible inspection appointment. If an announced digital view is not accessible to you, describe the missing access concretely. A screen message is not a substantive check of the bill.
Separate the request for inspection from a request for copies. For copies you should agree scope and cost in advance. The provision does not entail an automatic free dispatch of every document on your preferred channel.
Turn the appointment into an audit
Assign each disputed settlement line to a voucher: issuer, service, period and amount. For a collective voucher note which parts are allocated to which cost item. Photograph or copy documents only by an agreed admissible method; in any case make comprehensible personal notes.
An invoice can substantiate an actual expenditure without yet confirming its apportionability. Therefore check separately afterwards whether the service belongs to the correct cost category, fits the property and may be taken into account for the relevant period.
A hypothetical look into the building maintenance
Rana asks about a conspicuous item. At the appointment she sees that an invoice contains both ongoing maintenance and a separate one-off service. She notes both parts and requests the allocation to the settlement. She does not already declare the entire voucher inadmissible simply because it contains several services.
If exactly that voucher is missing, she notes which document was not available despite the request. Her later advice can thus distinguish between lack of access and an actually substantively contested expenditure.
When inspection continues to be blocked
Secure the request, response and offered appointments. § 21 paragraph 5 refers for non-compliance with settlement and inspection obligations to the enforcement named there. [MRG21] Have the appropriate application and the competent authority checked specifically. An indefinite announcement "I will pay nothing more" does not replace that.
Also do not expect an automatically extended audit or payment deadline merely because you have requested vouchers. This article does not establish such a consequence. Its result is a documented access to the documents or a precisely evidenced still-open inspection process.