› Flat Chat Strata Forum › Common Property › CP and the Strata Committee › Ducted Air-conditioning and repair responsibility › Current Page
Unless your Owners Corporation (O/C) has in the past resolved to create and register a Special By-Law covering Proprietors’ responsibility for the maintenance, repair, and replacement of air-conditioning systems serving only their lots, OR has included a statement of responsibility in any consent issued by it to the Proprietor when the system was originally installed, then…
as some components of ducted systems including the ducting itself and the zone motors are located in the roof void, and that area’s Common Property, the O/C is responsible for those and any indeed any other components of the system/s that are located outside the cubic air-space of the Lot.
So far as the insurance claim and the excess is concerned, the acceptance of a claim under fusion or any other component of your O/C’s Policy is entirely at the discretion of its Insurer, and from what you’ve advised in your post that’s the approach that your Strata Manager (SM) has taken. Again, in the absence of a Special By-Law or a statement of responsibility to the contrary, the excess on insurance claims is also payable by the O/C.
Further insurance claims of this (and other) types may well result in increased premiums and/or a requirement for evidence of a regular maintenance regime for all air-conditioning systems being imposed by your Plan’s Insurer, but of greater impact is the possibility that your O/C’s responsibility could extend to the costs of replacing all Proprietors’ ducted air-conditioning systems if/when those fail, simply because the systems’ components are outside the Lot/s.
That’s precisely why in my opinion your O/C needs to ensure that it enforces any Special By-Law or individual consents that may be in place, and if as I suspect none exists and if other Owners feel as you do, then your O/C needs to quickly put an appropriately worded Special By-Law in place by way of an item for consideration (by way of a Special Resolution) by Proprietors at a General Meeting; speak with your SM about the timing and the voting requirements for that.