If you bill tenants for water or electricity from your own meters, Rentor turns the monthly meter walk into a simple sheet: key what each meter says, snap a photo, and put the whole month on the rent bills in one press.

It all happens on one page, Bills & meters (under Money in a landlord's sidebar, Management in an agency's), on its Meter readings tab. The Tenant bills tab beside it is for a bill you're holding for one unit, a KPLC statement or a county water bill: you don't need a price or readings for that, just the amount and a photo of the bill. See Adding a tenant's bill.

Setting your price

1. Open Bills & meters, pick the property, and stay on the Meter readings tab.
2. At the top of the sheet is a one-line price form for each utility: Water: KES ___ per m³ → Save (electricity is priced per kWh). Key the price and click Save. That is the whole setup.
3. To change it later, click Edit price on the same line. An optional fixed monthly fee (sewerage, a service line) is set there too.

The unit rows sit right beneath the price line, so there is no separate set-up step before the first reading and the sheet is never empty. You can key readings before a price exists (see below); the price simply has to be there before anything is billed.

A price change applies to future readings only. Anything already priced keeps the price it was computed with, so a tenant's bill can never change under them. The one exception is a reading that was saved while the utility had no price yet: it takes the first price you save.

The monthly readings sheet

Pick the utility and the month at the top of the sheet. Every occupied unit gets a row showing the unit, the tenant, and the last reading.

1. Enter the Current reading for each unit. Rentor shows a live preview of the consumption and amount at your saved price. If there is no price yet, the row says Price not set yet and the reading is saved all the same.
2. First time reading this meter? You'll also enter an Opening reading, the baseline the first month is measured from.
3. Meter replaced or rolled over? Tick "Meter was replaced / rolled over" and write a short note. The tenant sees this on their bill, and the new meter's value counts as the consumption.
4. Add the meter photo. Tap "Add meter photo" and snap the meter face. This isn't optional decoration: billing refuses a reading without a photo, because the photo is the tenant's proof the number is real. They see it on their bill.
5. Click Save reading. Saved readings sit as drafts; you can still update or discard them.

Putting readings on the rent bills

When the walk is done, click "Add N to rent bills". Every draft reading with a photo and a price becomes a line on that tenant's current rent invoice: one invoice, one M-Pesa payment. Rentor confirms how many were billed and the total, and tells you how many were skipped and why: a missing photo, or a utility still waiting for a price. Nothing is ever put on a rent bill without a price. Save the price (it prices the waiting readings straight away) and press the button again. A billed reading shows "On the bill"; if you made a mistake, Remove from bill withdraws it.

The tenant's invoice shows the full working, "Meter: 100 → 112.5 = 12.5 m³ @ KES 150", plus a link to the meter photo. See Tenant utility bills for their view.

Recording one reading from the tenant's card

Open a tenant on Tenants and tap Record reading (it sits beside Add a bill). That opens the Meter readings tab with the property chosen and that unit's row highlighted, handy when one tenant's meter was missed on the walk.

If a caretaker does the walk

You can delegate the walk itself to a caretaker. They key the readings and photos from their own money-free account, on their own Bills & meters page; they never see your prices, the amounts, or tenant names. Each reading they enter is marked "entered by" with their name on your sheet, and Rentor nudges you once readings are in so you can review the computation and press the billing button yourself. If a caretaker records a reading before you've saved a price, it's kept and priced the moment you save one. The billing is always yours.

On the phone app: the readings sheet works on mobile too, handy for walking the building phone-in-hand. Find it under More → Manage → Meter Readings: same tenant rows, photo capture through your camera, the same price line above the rows for setting or changing a price, and the same "Add N to rent bills" button. A row without a price says Price not set yet, and the billing result tells you how many readings are waiting for one.