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Our strata building’s main power board is old and not up to current standards and requires an urgent upgrade. The electrical wiring in all units have been inspected and an upgrade to the wiring is essential as part of the mains board upgrade and for the safety of the building. The EC has received a quote for the job. Some units have previously been rewired and require minimum work. However most require major work, which will vary from unit to unit. Are we required to split the total cost by the owners strata levy % or can each owner pay the cost for the rewiring of their own unit and then split the cost of the mains board and common area rewiring based on the owners strata levy %?
It seems very unfair if some owners have paid for new wiring or purchased a unit with new wiring and be expected to pay a % of the rewiring of units belonging to owners who have not paid to rewire.
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hello ants ,our complex 17 ground floor units, situated in wa .complex is 33years old ,the minutes told a sad story,owners had complained about the electrics for 20 years but nobody did anything.all the wireing went through roof space ,now illegal first quote $54,000. western power said it was an emergency situation.three years later,after a new power pole on street with a transformer to get enough power into the complex.move units 8 to 17 electric meters half way down the complex. trench the driveway so units 8 to 17 could have new power leads installed.units 1 to7 had no electrical work done at all .end result $112,000.00 bill paid equally by all 17 owners because it was all common property works .10 happy owners 7 very UNHAPPY owners.
ants – assuming sufficient funds in the Sinking Fund, wouldn’t it be easier for the Owners Corporation (O/C) to simply pay its Contractor to undertake all the electrical works required, and for individual Owners to only themselves pay that Contractor for anything extra such as additional / double-powerpoints to replace singles within their Units?
You could well find that as the O/C’s Contractor has already inspected the wiring within individual Units and therefore knows the building’s distribution system (backbone), that the resultant ease of installation, less need for coordination with other Contractors, and less invoicing would result in a lesser cost overall (i.e. O/C + Owners’) – and everyone’s sharing the costs derived from the funds that they’ve already contributed.
Just a thought….. unless of course there’s not enough in the Sinking Fund (?).
Depending on the number of units that have already upgraded, I was going to suggest another tack.
First you pass a by-law making internal electrics (the wiring only servicing each individual unit) the lot owners’ responsibility. You explain that you are doing this so that some owners don’t have to pay twice for electricity upgrades.
And you stress that, for fire safety reasons, there can be no opt-out from the upgrade but owners can take advantage of a much cheaper rate from having all the rewiring done at the same time. Lot owners have a responsibility to maintain their lots so this is something that can be enforced at a later date (and at greater expense to the recalcitrant owners) if need be.
If everyone is in agreement, it should go ahead quite smoothly. And owners can use Strata Community Australia’s “Who’s responsible for what” document as the template for the by-law as it also covers electrical work.
The opinions offered in these Forum posts and replies are not intended to be taken as legal advice. Readers with serious issues should consult experienced strata lawyers.
The Strata is responsible for the wiring in the common areas but in apartments a lot of the walls are common property and so any wiring in these are Strata responsibility. Any wiring within the lot (not in a common wall) and servicing only that lot is lot owners responsibility.
In NSW it’s a nightmare.
Download a copy of these
2011_07_Defining_who_is_responsible_for_items_in_a_Strata_Scheme.pdf
2011_08_Identifying_common_property_in_a_existing_strata_scheme_2.pdf
which should help you through the nightmare.
I hold an electrical contractors licence and have experience in building electics.
Firstly, the wring rules change every few years. However there is no requirement to upgrade a building to any newer rules than when the building was built. The only exception that I know of is the installtion of smoke alarms.
You mention an upgrade. The starta laws require the OC to maintain the building (and its fittings) in good order, but do not require the OC to do upgrades, unless regulated by some law. In this case that is not the case.
What has prompted this need then?
The next question is why have some lots had upgraded wiring? If the owner chose to upgrade the lot owners wirring, then it was always a lot owners cost. If the lot owner also upgraded the common property wiring , then they have broken the bylaw about damaging common property, unless they had a by law (I suspect not).
In the proposed upgrade, then the OC will pay only for the common property wiring. The lot owner wiring part has to be paid by the lot owner. I do not think there is any way to force an unwilling lot owner to do any upgrade (see my first paragraph).
Robert
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