BorderBird
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Pillar 2 · Utility tracking · Max Snowbird tier

Your utility bills, sorted to the right property automatically.

Forward your utility-bill emails from 60+ providers — Hydro One, Enbridge, Toronto Water, ConEd, PG&E, Veolia and more — and BorderBird reads them, importing each one against the right property. It never connects to your inbox. Categorized by type, dated correctly, ready to deduct on Schedule E line 17 or T776 line 9220.

Try BorderBird free →See Max Snowbird pricing
Honest scope — property-level import, not per-tenant splitting (yet)

What it actually does

Forwarding-based utility bill detection

Set up one forwarding filter — set once, ~2 minutes — that forwards your utility-bill emails to your private BorderBird address, then it runs itself. BorderBird reads the bills you forward from over 70 utility providers — recognized by sender domain, subject pattern, and statement structure — and never connects to your inbox. Each detection includes the provider name, billing period, amount, and where available, the PDF statement attachment for your records.

Property routing by address match

BorderBird extracts the service address from each forwarded bill and matches it against your property list. If you have one Phoenix property and one Toronto property, the FPL bill goes to Phoenix and the Toronto Hydro bill goes to Toronto without you doing anything. Ambiguous matches go to a review queue.

Bill vs receipt — cash basis stays right

A statement saying you owe $312 and a confirmation that you paid $312 are different events with different tax dates. BorderBird tracks both. For cash-basis reporting (the default for individual landlords), the deduction follows the receipt date — not the bill issue date — so December utilities paid in January correctly land in next year's deduction.

Five categories, mapped to the right line item

Imports are categorized as Electricity, Gas, Water, Internet, or Other utilities. On year-end export, all five roll up to Schedule E line 17 (US properties) or T776 line 9220 (Canadian properties), grouped by property and by month.

Review queue — nothing auto-posts

Every utility import lands in /imports/utilities first as a pending entry. You confirm property, amount, and date, then click Import. Rejected imports stay in the audit log so you can retrace what was discarded if you ever need to.

Supported providers (60+ and growing)

A representative sample. New parsers added based on user requests — if your provider isn't listed, file a request after signup and it usually ships within two weeks.

🇨🇦 Canadian providers
  • Hydro One
  • Toronto Hydro
  • BC Hydro
  • Hydro-Québec
  • ENMAX
  • EPCOR
  • Enbridge Gas
  • Fortis BC
  • Toronto Water
  • Bell Canada (Internet)
  • Rogers (Internet)
  • Telus
  • Shaw
🇺🇸 US providers
  • ConEd
  • PG&E
  • Duke Energy
  • FPL (Florida Power & Light)
  • SDG&E
  • SoCal Edison
  • National Grid
  • Veolia (Water)
  • American Water
  • Comcast Xfinity
  • AT&T
  • Verizon Fios

What utility tracking does NOT do (yet)

No per-tenant splitting. A bill for a triplex currently lands as one expense against the property, not as three expenses split across three units. If you recharge utilities to specific tenants pro rata, you handle the recovery side separately as rental income line items.

No utility budget tracking or forecasting. The current feature is record-keeping focused: capture, categorize, deduct. Trend analysis and budget alerts are on the roadmap.

No paper-bill OCR. Forwarded-email capture only. Paper bills mean manual entry, which is supported on the Expenses page but not auto-imported.

No bill-pay integration. BorderBird does not pay utility providers on your behalf. Auto-pay stays with the provider or your bank.

Utility tracking — FAQ

Which tier do I need for utility tracking?
Utility tracking is on the Max Snowbird plan only — $59 CAD / $44 USD per month (or $539 CAD / $399 USD per year). Free Snowbird and Pro Snowbird tiers do not include forwarded utility import. The reasoning: utility import is computationally intensive (we parse every bill email you forward) and benefits the snowbird audience most, where utility costs are a major deductible category against US rental income.
How many utility providers does BorderBird support today?
Over 60 providers across Canada and the US — major electric, gas, water, and internet utilities for the metros where Canadian and US rental property concentrates (Toronto, Vancouver, Montreal, Calgary, Florida, Arizona, California, Texas, Washington, New York). The full list is in the app under Settings → Providers. We add new provider parsers based on user requests; if your provider isn't supported, the bill goes to the manual import flow.
Does utility tracking split bills across multiple tenants?
Not currently. The current implementation imports utilities at the property level — a bill for 123 Maple St becomes a property expense, not a per-tenant expense. If you have a multi-unit property where utilities are shared and recharged to tenants pro rata, you'd handle the recovery side separately as rental income line items. Per-tenant utility allocation is on the roadmap.
What's the difference between a 'bill' and a 'receipt' in BorderBird?
A bill is the statement showing the amount you owe for a billing period. A receipt is the confirmation that payment was made. For cash-basis tax reporting (which is the default for Canadian and most US individual landlords), the deductible expense lands in the year you paid — i.e., the receipt date — not the year the bill was issued. BorderBird tracks both so the right date applies regardless of when you log into the app.
Are utilities deductible against my rental income?
Generally yes, when the landlord pays the utility (not the tenant). On Schedule E for the US, utilities you pay go on line 17. On Form T776 for Canada, they go on line 9220 ('Utilities'). If the tenant pays utilities directly to the provider, you don't deduct them — and you also don't include them in rental income. If the tenant reimburses you, the reimbursement is rental income and the bill is a deductible expense, netting to zero.
What about utilities at properties on both sides of the border?
BorderBird treats every property as having its own jurisdiction — a property's tax_jurisdiction field determines whether its utilities map to Schedule E line 17 (US property) or T776 line 9220 (Canadian property). Year-end reports group correctly by jurisdiction. A snowbird with a Toronto rental and a Phoenix rental sees one combined utility expense view in the app and two separate jurisdiction-correct numbers in the year-end exports.
Does BorderBird auto-pay utilities for me?
No. BorderBird is a record-keeping tool — it never initiates payment to a third party. Auto-pay stays with your bank or the utility provider's own pre-authorized debit. BorderBird's job is to capture the statement, route it to the right property, and produce the tax-ready expense entry.
What if my utility provider sends paper bills, not email?
BorderBird only reads the bill emails you forward, so it can't capture a paper bill. Paper bills require manual entry on the Expenses page — same as any other manual expense. Most major providers default to e-billing now, but if yours doesn't, you can switch to e-billing on the provider's website so the bill arrives as email you can forward.
Related
Rent tracking →Cashflow / dual-currency P&L →Tax reporting →Max Snowbird pricing →See the full software →