I just want to clarify the comments I made earlier in relation to Apprehended Personal Violence Orders (APVOs).
This is what I actually wrote:
Otherwise, if you feel her complaints amount to harassment, you could apply at your local court for an Apprehended Personal Violence Order (APVO) requiring her not to contact you except via a lawyer.
The key phrase there is “if you feel her complaints amount to harassment”. Obviously, an APVO is not a first (or second or third) response to complaints from a neighbour. But if there was a relentless campaign of complaint upon complaint, to the point where you were frightened to move around your own home, you might start looking at more extreme measures.
This evolved into a side debate about whether seeking an APVO is ever appropriate in a dispute between neighbours (and I seem to be the only person who thinks there are situations that don’t involve actual physical violence when an APVO might be).
However, what we should probably focus on is how much neighbour noise we should be prepared to tolerate, how our complaints are presented and how the neighbours respond.
Every situation is different. You don’t want to be constantly whingeing but then you shouldn’t let your frustrations build to the point where the first the noisy neighbour knows about the problem is when you are on their doorstep in a monumental rage.
Leading on from Erte’s post above, perhaps a note from your owners corporation to all owners asking residents to be mindful of the noise they could be making and tolerant of the additional noise they may be hearing from more people spending more time at home, might defuse some of the tensions.
But our strata schemes are awash with inadequately insulated timber and tile floors, so this problem will persist long after the pandemic has faded away.