My friend recently moved to Barcelona. She moved into a flat with a married couple and another man. The flat had three bedrooms and two bathrooms. Extremely dissatisfied with the living conditions (ie no heat, electricity constantly went out, flatmates were messy) she moved out. She had stayed from the 30th of September 08 to the 2nd of February 09. While she knew she did not give two weeks notice, she did expect to get most of her deposit back. She gave a 300 euro deposit and received 110 euros back. The husband was subletting the flat, so he was in charge of rent. His logic went as follows:

They agreed to a 350 euro a month rent. He told her all bills were included. So the bills were approximately 50 euros a month. However, he charged her for 1/3 of the bills when there were four people living there. He counted himself and his spouse as on person. She was charged for the telephone and television bills when she did not use the telephones or television.

He charged her 75 euros for only giving 7 or 8 days notice, which seems a little expensive, but fair enough.

He then proceeded to calculate the monthly bills. He added up the bills for September (she was only there for one day in Sept), October, November, December and January. It added up to 1099.81 euros. He then showed his calculations. He divided it into thirds (366 euros) even though there were four people living there and then divided that by 5 months (she only lived there four), totaling 73 euros a month. He subtracted 50 euros from that because he felt that 50 euros from the 350 for rent went toward bills, and calculated that she owes him 23 extra euros for 5 months.

He never told her this beforehand, and when she first moved in, he said that rent was 350 euros a month, all bills included. Neither of them wrote anything or signed any documents.

If anything, he did not charge her rent for September, so it is not fair to ask her to pay for the difference in bills for that month.

What are my friend's rights? What can she do about this to get her money back?

I would be very grateful for any answers.