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@JimmyT said:Strata insurance will generally NOT cover you for anything inside your property. Tenants should have their own home and contents insurance too.
Actually strata building insurance generally covers “Lot Owners’ fixtures and improvements”, eg CHU’s Residential Strata, policy 10. That includes kitchen fixtures, bathrooms fixtures etc.
It’s a compulsory part of strata building insurance in NSW, VIC, ACT and perhaps other states.
Landlords should have landlord insurance to cover what’s not covered by the strata building insurance as well as tenant protection (due to rent defaults etc).
Tenants should have contents insurance to cover their own possessions and legal liabilities (I don’t think they could get home insurance on a building they don’t own).
@unitxchange said:
FYI – The former OC manager resigned when presented with the petition and they have not broken any requirements under the OC Act.
I think that changes the circumstances somewhat. A manager can choose to resign at any time provided they are not breaking the management contract. They don’t need the OC’s approval to do that.
Whether a manager accepts a petition or not is up to them. But as they are a strata manager, they’d be well aware of any required OC process and could choose to challenge any removal process if they considered it was invalid.
While by-laws can be reasonably easy to create in NSW we shouldn’t forget that in other parts of the country it can be quite a task!
In Victoria you need a Special Resolution to create Rules with at least needs 50% of the whole OC actually voting and voting for it (and that’s only for an Interim SR)! None of my OCs in Victoria have ever managed to achieve this.
What we have done re CCTV footage in my Victorian OCs is leave the access permission to the committee or the building manager. So far that seems to work well.
We considered developing guidelines and policies but in reality some of the events where access has been requested are quite hard to predict. A certain amount of flexibility has been needed. A committee decision in my OCs is pretty quick – it can be done by emails.
Our CCTV systems automatically overwrite footage once the hard-drive is full. So any access request must be made fairly promptly.
unitxchange said Is an ordinary resolution sufficient as opposed to unanimous or special resolution to do this?
An ordinary resolution is sufficient. Even the committee alone usually has the power to change a manager unless it has been formally restricted from doing so and it does not override an earlier general meeting’s decision.
If so, can this be done without consultation with the full committee and without due process i.e. a special general meeting so all owners can vote and ask questions about fees and service?
The decision to call a special general meeting need not go to the full committee. The Chairperson or the Secretary alone can convene and set the agenda for a special general meeting. That meeting can optionally be conducted by ballot, even on-line. But it must be formally arranged and conducted with correct notices and processes.
Can an owners corporation use an AGM to legitimise their takeover in the absence of formal paperwork?
I think that if it’s on the agenda, once the AGM votes to accept the new manager, that vote would be valid. The time to challenge any earlier change of manager process would be before the AGM.
What forms do we, as owners, need to see for an owners corporation takeover to be considered legitimate?
You’d need to see the minutes of a correctly conducted general or committee meeting.
If no formal paperwork is needed apart from a petition, it seems an unethical way to take over an owners corporation.
A vote by ballot can look like a petition. But to be a valid ballot it must be formally conducted according to the OC Act. Some further information is here:
If the “outgoing” manager is still under a valid contract and has not broken any of their requirements under the OC Act, it’s unlikely they can be removed.
I note that some contents insurers will only cover:
floating wooden floors paid for by you after the building was built
While other contents insurers will cover floating floors regardless.
I’ve tried claiming floating floor damage from the OC building insurance. They have referred me back to the contents insurer. CHU (considered to be a market leader) for example specifically exclude floating floors in their strata building insurance:
Building means:
…
fixtures and structural improvements other than Floating Floors;
But include them in their strata lot owner contents insurance.
I hope you are not caught by a cover gap between the OC’s building insurer and your contents insurer!
It’s odd that the contents insurer is not accepting a floating floor as contents similar to a carpet.
What is their reasoning?
Perhaps they are (incorrectly in my view) classing it as a structural wood floor in which case a claim could be made on the Owners Corporation’s building insurance.
To add, although all the compulsory strata insurance quotes for my OC has not included WCI, they have included Personal Accident/Voluntary Workers cover.
Strataman has an opinion on WCI for NSW:
@sydprop said:
Trying to work this out. I would have thought that (NSW) that workers compensation insurance covers the liability under the workplace injury and workers compensation act.
What is the link to WHS? even if you have all proper measures in place, someone can still hurt themselves.
AFAIK it’s the WHS laws that require the workers compensation insurance. A residential OC is usually exempt from the WHS laws so doesn’t need the insurance because a claim can’t be made.
Contractors and others, by law, must meet the WHS laws either themselves or by their actual employer.
An OC’s duty of care would generally involve building compliance and maintenance according to the BCC/NCC. And an OC should have public liability insurance which is usually compulsory.
I agree with scotlandx.
There’s a fair bit of confusion and fear around this topic.
And it’s simply easier for most Strata Managers to claim that WHS cover is always needed. You after all can’t be too careful.
The fact is that residential stratas are specifically excluded in the national WHS Act, which most states and territories have adopted to their state/territory versions.
That’s here in the Work Health and Safety Regulations 2011:
7 Meaning of person conducting a business or undertaking—persons excluded
(1) For subsection 5(6) of the Act, a strata title body corporate that is responsible for any common areas used only for residential purposes may be taken not to be a person conducting a business or undertaking in relation to those premises.
(2) Subregulation (1) does not apply if the strata title body corporate engages any worker as an employee.
In short, a residential body corporate is not a PCBU and has the same WHS status as a private house, unless it actually employs someone. A contractor is not employing someone. Volunteer workers and visitors need not be covered.
Although Victoria has not adopted the national legislation, it’s the same.
A residential strata still needs to meet a duty of care. But that applies to all in the complex including residents and visitors. That’s not WHS.
JimmyT said Compulsory strata insurance “covers all the buildings” means, basically, common property and all that entails.
I think it’s more accurate to say that compulsory strata building insurance covers what the legislation says it must cover. And that varies from state to state and even from strata scheme to strata scheme. It can cover considerably more than just common property. It can cover lot owned building structures and other lot property including “owners’ improvements and owners’ fixtures”.
In NSW for example:
161 Requirements for damage policy
(3) Parts of building to be covered
The parts of a building to be covered by a damage policy include the following:
(a) owners’ improvements and owners’ fixtures forming part of the building,Other states have that requirement too.
Stratas in VIC and ACT can have entire buildings that are actually lot property, especially in horizontal type stratas. But even in my Melbourne CBD high rise, I was surprised to discover, on advice from a strata lawyer, that the upper floor in my 2 floor apartment is actually lot property! It’s all still covered by compulsory strata building insurance because the strata act in VIC states that it must be. In the ACT, class B units (horizontal type stratas) can be exempted from compulsory strata building insurance if voted that way at every AGM.
JimmyT said ‘… often covers lot fixtures and improvements” means what? Kitchen cupboards? An internal shelf on a wall? An approved extension? An unapproved extension? Either way, the word “often” should have readers looking at their policies to see what actually is covered.
They should be looking in the legislation too. Because if that cover is compulsory there’s no ‘often’ in that case. That cover must be included in compulsory strata building insurance in ACT, NSW, VIC and probably other states too. But it would be optional in the cases where compulsory strata building insurance was not required.
It seems in the OP’s case, there is building insurance cover for the damage but the committee doesn’t want to claim on it.
Actually, compulsory strata building insurance usually covers all the building(s).
That’s common property building structures but also private lot property building structures. It also often covers lot fixtures and improvements. Sometimes it’s legislated that way (eg NSW, VIC, ACT) but with all my OC’s policies (they are all CHU) it’s actually written that way or in the case of lot fixtures and improvements, offered as an optional policy. CHU’s residential strata policy does however only cover common contents.
Try taking out any type of building insurance if you are a lot owner in a strata apartment building. Insurance companies will only offer you contents insurance. That contents insurance might cover damage to buildings if you are found to be legally liable for that damage and do not have another insurance policy that covers it.
I know of individual owners, myself included, who have by-passed the strata committee when making strata building insurance claims. The strata manager/insurance broker/insurance company themselves decided if the claim was acceptable and valid. Those claims have been for both common property (usually inside a lot) and for lot property. CHU now even allows lot owners to directly make such a claim on-line: Make a claim for strata
I have just now re-confirmed this with CHU. They allow lot owners make strata building insurance claims directly. Owners are part of the OC and are automatically covered. It’s for this reason that owners can’t be pursed by the OC’s insurance company to recover damage caused by negligence payouts the way that tenants can be. Of course this is not a guarantee that the claim will be accepted. But I’ve had payouts when done this way.
In the OP’s situation, I would think the damaged property will probably be common property. And if so, the OC has to repair it. Assuming the repair costs are worth claiming (the cost is more than the excess), the OC has the option of claiming those repair costs on its building insurance. If instead the repair costs were passed to the lot owner, the lot owner could try claiming them directly.
I think excess should be the only deciding matter.
An OC has an obligation to repair common property.
I would have thought the damage would be covered by the OC’s building insurance.
Even if the damage was due to an owner’s negligence, I believe the owner has a right to request a claim on the OC’s building insurance. An owner, being part of the OC, has contributed to the insurance policy and should be automatically covered. It’s different for a tenant who is not automatically covered.
If the EC refuses to claim, the owner could try claiming directly.
As for excesses, it’s usually the claiming party that has to pay them. Generally the OC claims for common property damage while owners claim for lot property damage.
Indeed the OC has to meet the NCC/BCC requirements on common property stairway handrails that applied when the stairs were constructed.
And it’s probably not a bad idea to apply the current requirements (if they have changed) in the interests of general safety.
My OC has now installed 2 of them. I found it curious that handrails weren’t already installed but on checking the current NCC/BCC requirements, they aren’t actually compulsory for stairs that have a wall on each side of them – which was the case for us. We installed them anyway.
The OC where I live had a similar request.
In our case the handrail was for 3 or 4 steps directly outside the requesting lot but in a common lobby area. The committee (I am the chair) decided to install it at OC expense. So the handrail become an asset to the common property.
As it turned out, other’s found it useful too!
If the handrail was to be installed in a lot property area or if it was only the requesting lot that would benefit from it, it might be fair enough for the requesting lot to pay for its installation.
rhea said But we would never know because neither the owners nor committee members had visibility/access to the response received.
Then, for goodness sakes, how do others know what the responses were and if they were indeed actually made? Openness in these matters is paramount.
Considering that many OC/BC decisions in many states can actually be made by electronic means or by poll, this is an important matter for the Treasurer to respond to.
@rhea said:Just to highlight, the Treasurer is the only person who will have visibility to the survey responses from all owners.If the Treasurer is claiming to represent the OC, that information must be open to anyone in OC. Else it’s hearsay from the Treasurer.
If the Treasurer is only representing themselves (as I suspect they are), then the information is likely to be irrelevant to any official vote. An official vote still has to be made.