Flat Chat Strata Forum

Welcome to the Flat Chat Forum where your questions can be answered by me (JimmyT), industry experts or other readers who’ve had similar issues. Anyone can post a question or reply to a post – you no longer need to register first.

QUESTIONS: Ready to post a question? Choose the sub-forum closest to your area of interest from the list below, click on its title then click on the words “Create New Topic” near the top of the window. A new window will appear asking you to provide a nickname, your email address, a headline summarising your question and a space for the question you want to ask.

ANONYMITY: Please do not use your real name as your screen name (nickname). Identifying yourself also identifies anyone you are complaining about and that could lead to legal problems. 

REPLIES: Just want to read and respond?  You’ll find links to our latest posts on the right, below our sponsors’ ads (or further down on a phone). Just click on the topic you’re interested in, word reply and away you go. However, if you want to start a completely different thread, then follow the instructions above.

SUBSCRIBING: You can subscribe to individual posts – meaning you will receive and email alert every time someone responds – but you will have to be registered (with an active email address) and login before the magic button that allows that appears ar rthe bottom of the post.

PATIENCE, please: Don’t worry if your post doesn’t appear immediately. All posts are moderated by me and I am not an AI bot. I am a human being who occasionally sleeps, does other work or watches football but I will get to your question immediately. If you have a strata emergency you should be contacting your strata manager, building manager or strata secretary. If you are about to walk into an AGM, you have probably left it too late (but you can try).

SO MANY PAGES: Forum posts are displayed with the original question at the top then the responses in chronological order with the most recent response at the end. That means to follow the entire thread to the conclusion of a particularly long discussion you may even have to click on to a later page. If there is more than one page, the page numbers are displayed on the right under the last post in that page. The original topic is reproduced at the top of every subsequent page.

DOUBLE DIPPING: One last thing – please don’t double-dip. By that we mean asking the same question or continuing the same discussion in a new thread. If you haven’t received a reply to your post, just click on “reply” and give our readers a nudge. “Anybody there?” usually does it. If you start a new topic with the same question, both will probably be deleted and if you do it multiple times, we’ll probaly suspend your log-in.

NEWSLETTER: It’s a really good idea to register for the newsletter as every week you will get a summary of the laterst stories – including a roundup of Forum posts – plus an editorial message from me about whatever is interesting or bugging me that week. Registering is easy (click on the panel) and unsubscribing is even easier if you change your mind. You just click on a line at the bottom of the newsletter. Give it a go, you might like it.

JimmyT, July 2026