Who Pays to Fix the Fridge in a Winnipeg Rental?

In Manitoba the landlord has to do the repairs and keep the unit in good condition, so an appliance that came with the rental is the landlord's to fix. The tenant pays only for damage the tenant caused. The part almost nobody gets right is what happens next when the landlord does not act, because a broken fridge is not treated the same way as a broken furnace. This page walks the actual route the Residential Tenancies Branch publishes, including the compensation claim that most tenants never find out exists.

The short answer, by situation

The Branch's own wording on the split is short. A landlord must "do repairs and keep the unit in good condition." A tenant must "take reasonable care not to damage the rental unit," repair any damage that does occur, and "notify the landlord of necessary repairs." Age and ordinary wear sit with the landlord. Impact, misuse and overloading sit with the tenant.

The distinction that decides how fast you can push

This is the part worth understanding before making a single phone call, because it explains why the process feels slower than people expect.

Manitoba's framework treats essential services as a specific short list: heat, gas, electricity, hot and cold water, and other public utilities the landlord is required to provide. A landlord must ensure the supply of those and must not interfere with them. That is the category with real urgency attached.

Appliances are not on that list. In the Branch's material they appear instead as a service or facility that the landlord provides, grouped with parking, laundry facilities and air conditioning.

The process, in the order it actually works

1. Put the request in writing. Not a text to the caretaker, not a conversation in the hallway. The Branch is specific that tenants "should put the request in writing and give it to the landlord, not just the on-site caretaker." Date it. Say what the appliance is, what it is doing, and when it started. Keep a copy.

2. Do not hold back the rent. The Branch states this plainly: if the landlord refuses to do necessary and reasonable repairs, a tenant should not withhold rent. Withholding converts a strong position into a weak one, because now there are two disputes instead of one, and the second is about arrears.

3. Ask the Branch for help. Send your written information to the landlord and a copy to the Residential Tenancies Branch. There is a Tenant's Request for Repairs Form for Winnipeg and the surrounding area. The Branch contacts the landlord, and may inspect the unit.

4. The Branch gives time, then orders. If repairs are needed, the landlord gets a reasonable amount of time to do the work. If they are not done, the Branch will order the landlord to finish by a certain date.

5. Appeal, and the last resort. A landlord who disagrees with an Order can ask the Residential Tenancies Commission to review it. If the landlord still refuses after all that, the Branch has the authority to hire a contractor, and the tenant then sends the rent to the Branch, which uses the money to pay for the work. Tenants should send money to the Branch only when asked to, never on their own initiative.

The compensation claim most tenants never make

This is the genuinely useful part, and it is the reason the essential-service distinction above matters rather than being trivia.

If a landlord causes an unreasonable delay in making necessary repairs, the tenant can file a claim for compensation with the Branch. The claim can be for loss of use of a service or facility the landlord provides, and the Branch's published example list names appliances directly, alongside parking, laundry and air conditioning.

What that means in practice: a month without the fridge that came with the unit is a month you did not receive part of what you are paying rent for, and that is claimable. So are additional expenses caused by the delay. The Branch's own illustration is a higher water bill caused by a landlord not fixing a dripping tap, and the same logic covers the costs a dead appliance creates.

A few mechanics worth knowing before you start:

• You must specify a dollar amount. The Branch does not calculate it for you.
• You can claim a lump sum, or an amount set off against the rent each month until the repair is made.
• There is a $50 filing fee, and the Branch holds a hearing to decide whether compensation is owed and how much.
• You can apply only if the landlord failed to act on a request to repair, which is why step 1 above is not optional paperwork. Without the written request there is nothing to show was ignored.
• You must show the repair is necessary and that you are not the cause of the problem.

That last condition is where most weak claims fall apart, and it is also where a diagnosis in writing changes the picture. "The washer will not drain" is an assertion. "The drain pump has failed" is a finding, and it establishes both that the repair is necessary and that nobody overloaded anything.

For landlords: the cheaper way to handle this

Nothing above is adversarial by design, and the Branch route is slow and expensive for a landlord compared with the alternative.

A service call diagnoses the fault and gives you a price before any work happens, and in most Winnipeg rental appliances the fault is a cheap part rather than a dead machine. A washer that will not drain is usually a drain pump or a blocked filter. A dryer that runs cold is usually a thermal fuse, which blows because the venting is restricted, which is worth fixing anyway because restricted dryer venting is a fire risk in a building you own. A fridge that stopped cooling is very often a start relay or a defrost fault rather than a compressor.

The arithmetic is not close. A repair in the typical Winnipeg price bands against a Branch order, a possible Commission appeal, and a compensation claim assessed for every month of delay.

The Winnipeg cases that come up most

• Fridge in a suite that is not cooling. The food loss is immediate and the clock on a compensation claim starts with your written notice, so send it the same day rather than waiting to see whether it recovers overnight.
• Only one of two appliances works. A dead dryer with a working washer is still a loss of use of a facility. Partial does not mean nothing.
• Appliance the tenant brought in. The landlord has no repair obligation for a machine that is not theirs, regardless of how long it has been in the unit.
• Disagreement about who caused it. The tenant carries the burden of showing they are not the cause, so a technician's written diagnosis is worth more here than in any other scenario.
• The unit was already broken at move-in. A landlord is required to do repairs whether or not the problem predates the tenancy, and a completed condition report at move-in is the cleanest evidence of what was wrong when you arrived.

Where to confirm any of this

This page summarises the Residential Tenancies Branch's published fact sheets on repairs and on the responsibilities of landlords and tenants, and it is a summary rather than legal advice. The Branch answers questions directly and it is free to ask.

Residential Tenancies Branch, Winnipeg Office. 1700 to 155 Carlton Street, Winnipeg MB R3C 3Y4. Telephone 204-945-2476, toll free 1-800-782-8403, email rtb@gov.mb.ca. The Branch publishes its fact sheets and forms at manitoba.ca/rtb.

What we do and do not do

We repair appliances in Winnipeg. We are not lawyers, we are not the Residential Tenancies Branch, and we cannot decide a dispute or tell you how a hearing will go. We have published this because the question comes up on the phone constantly and the answer is genuinely hard to assemble from the source material, which splits it across two separate fact sheets.

What we can do is the technical half. A diagnosis tells you what failed, whether it is worth repairing, and what it costs, in writing. For a landlord that usually ends the matter at the cheapest point available. For a tenant it turns a complaint into evidence. If you want the appliance looked at, book a visit or call, and if it turns out the machine is beyond saving, where an old appliance goes in Winnipeg covers the disposal side.