Hi everyone, I’d like to get some opinions about a situation we’re currently facing in our apartment in Switzerland. We moved into our apartment, and almost immediately (within the first days), we noticed that the toilet water level would rise unusually high after flushing. Since the building is quite old, we initially assumed this might be normal. About 10 days after moving in, the toilet became completely clogged. We tried to fix it ourselves without success. The apartment manager also attempted to unclog it but failed, so a plumbing company was called. They worked on it for about 2 hours. Shortly after, we received a report stating that cleaning rags were blocking the pipes, which surprised us, as we never flushed anything other than toilet paper. Along with that, we received a bill of nearly 900 CHF, only two weeks after moving in. After the intervention, everything worked fine again, but only for a few weeks. Then the toilet started clogging again, with water draining very slowly. This time, we used a tool ourselves to inspect and remove what was blocking the pipes. What we found were paper-like materials. After removing them, the toilet started functioning normally again. Since then, we have stopped flushing toilet paper entirely and now dispose of it in a bin next to the toilet. This is obviously not ideal, but we want to avoid another expensive intervention. We informed the apartment manager that we do not believe the initial blockage was our responsibility, especially given that the issue started almost immediately after moving in, the building and plumbing system appear to be very old as mentioned by the technician, and we only ever used normal toilet paper. However, we have now received a payment reminder for the 900 CHF. My questions: Has anyone experienced a similar issue in Switzerland? In such cases, is the tenant really responsible for these costs? Could this be considered a pre-existing issue with the plumbing system? What would you recommend doing in this situation? Thanks a lot for your insights! submitted by /u/SignificantBall1410
Originally posted by u/SignificantBall1410 on r/Switzerland