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You might be able to sell them on this by mentioning insurers reduce premiums on rewired buildings!
You just have to tell them they’re wrong and they can either waste money on lawyers and then fix it anyway, or just fix it.
The reply I received from the OC claims they have legal advice supporting their position. How can I dispute this? I suspect that getting a lawyer might cost more than just paying for the rewiring.
SteveBoo said:
The wiring the OC has declined to repair is in a metal conduit embedded in a concrete ceiling (which is also the floor of the unit above, I think).
You might be able to sell them on this by mentioning insurers reduce premiums on rewired buildings!
If it’s an art deco building, with split metal conduit in the ceiling slab – and usually running down the walls too – you could well be looking at vulcanised Indian rubber, single conductor wiring. Even if working fine now, it’s well past it’s use by date.
We still have some remnant in the ceilings here that went out when moisture penetrated recently. It’s better to be proactive on replacing it before it fails I will say.
The OC is keen for this to happen, but they believe all wiring serving only one unit should be replaced by the unit owner. I can see the sense in this: the unit owner has to replace the wiring in the walls; why should their responsibility end where the wire enters the ceiling? But as far as I can tell, this is what the act says, and a unit owner and OC would have to cooperate in and co-finance the full re-wiring of a unit.
Fair Trading’s much-quoted “Who’s responsible …?” document is ambiguous on this as it says that wiring in a ceiling is common property but wiring in a wall that services only one unit isn’t. Complicating the issue is that many apartments have false or dropped ceilings which, according to my block’s lawyers, are technically a wall.
So I would say that if the wiring is embedded in a concrete ceiling, then it is common property but if it is above a dropped ceiling and only serves that unit, then it is lot property. Make sense?
I believe the “Who’s responsible …?” document says that wiring in *internal* walls isn’t common property; wiring in *common* walls is common property. A common wall is one that abuts another unit or common property, and this includes ceilings (which abut one or the other).
A dropped ceiling isn’t a common wall; it’s internal to the unit.
The wiring the OC has declined to repair is in a metal conduit embedded in a concrete ceiling (which is also the floor of the unit above, I think).
In a unit, wiring IN the ceiling will be common property. The OC is required to maintain the common property.
The OC refused to repair the wiring in my ceiling on the grounds that it services just my unit and isn’t “common infrastructure”.
Thanks for the reply. I agree that having an electrical distribution board (DB) in each unit is a good solution, but I’m questioning the OC’s right to impose it. Reasonable grounds to object might be that everything works fine the way it is and there’s no need to spend money fixing what isn’t broken. Or it might be that there’s no convenient place for a DB inside a tiny 1-bedroom unit. Or it might be that, like me, you would like to move your DB into your unit, but at a time and cost that suits you.
I recently asked the OC to repair some faulty wiring in my ceiling on the grounds that it was common property. The OC’s position was that wiring that serves only one unit is the responsibility of the unit owner. Now they propose to use OC funds to upgrade 30+ electrical circuits that each only service one unit. If they can do that, what gives them the right to refuse to fix other common property wiring?
I would actually like move my DB into my unit sooner rather than later and not be hamstrung by the process the OC will have to go through to get this approved — if indeed it is approved.
So my question is still “whose responsibility is the wiring from the electricity meter to the unit?” Can the OC choose to upgrade it, moving the DB in the process (and can they force the unit owner to have the DB inside their unit)? Or do these choices lie with each owner?
Thanks again.
Sorry about the multiple posts. The first time I pressed “Submit” nothing seemed to happen. I may have pressed it again, but I’d be surprised if this submitted my post a second time, but who knows? But then my browser’s progress bar got about halfway then stopped, and then the browser told me the server had stopped responding. So I went back and wrote the post a second time and submitted that, and again I got no notification that the post had been submitted and here I gave up. Apparently, they all got through. Sorry about that.
taking their suggestion that you fix it yourself as permission to get the work done,
That’s the bit that stuns me. If we’re in agreement that my ceiling is common property, don’t I need OC approval to work on it?
If they have a problem with that, they can either raise it now or later at a tribunal
I’d hope to sort this our without involving NCAT.
Thanks again.
The paragraph you quote deals with, first, what happens when wiring that serves only one unit breaks inside the unit the second, what happens when wiring the serves more than one unit breaks outside the unit. As far as I can see it skirts the issue of wiring that serves only one unit breaking outside the unit.
However, further down that same page it says:
6. Owners corporation must repair anything in the ceiling.
That seems unambiguous to me.
there’s an electrical and fire safety issue here and that alone should tell you that the perished cabling can’t be lot owner’s responsibility.
The VIR wiring wholly within my unit is no less an electrical and fire safety issue, but I’m pretty sure it’s my responsibility. I’ll be thrilled to learn the OC has to replace it!
Thanks again.
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