(a) At any time before or after service within the utility's corporate limits is discontinued by a public utility on account of nonpayment by the landlord ratepayer, the affected tenants may apply to the utility to have service continued or resumed. A public utility shall not discontinue such service or shall promptly resume service previously discontinued if it receives from the tenants an amount equal to the bill of the landlord ratepayer for the 30-day period preceding the notice to the tenants. Thereafter, such utility shall notify each tenant of the total amount of the bill for the second and each succeeding period of 30 days or less and if the tenants fail to make payment of any such bill within 30 days of the delivery of the notice to the tenants, the utility may commence discontinuance procedures: Provided, That no such discontinuance may occur until 30 days after each tenant has received written notice of the proposed discontinuance as prescribed in section 8.¹ All payments by tenants to a utility on account of nonpayment by the landlord ratepayer shall be made by a check or money order drawn by the tenant to the order of the utility. Upon receiving any such payment, the utility shall notify the landlord ratepayer who is liable for the utility service of the amount or amounts paid by any tenant and the amount or amounts credited to the landlord's bill for each tenant pursuant to the provisions of this section. In the event that the tenants fail to satisfy the requirements of this section to maintain or restore service and service to the affected dwelling units is discontinued, the utility shall refund to each tenant the amount paid by such tenant toward the bill which the tenants failed to pay, upon the request of the tenant or after holding the tenant's payment during 60 consecutive days of discontinued service, whichever occurs first.

(b) Any tenant of a residential building or mobile home park who has been notified of a proposed discontinuance of utility service pursuant to section 3² shall have the right to agree to subscribe for future service individually if this can be accomplished without a major revision of distribution facilities or additional right-of-way acquisitions.