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Hi
Does an owner, committee, or OC have any rights to take legal action against a previous strata manager for negligence?
We are in the middle of a defect claim against a builder. We managed to get a Lawyer, some reports and submit our claim before the warranty expired, but not without significant issues with the strata manager we’d had for the previous 5 years. It’s since turned out that they did some very odd things, including (but not limited to), deleting urgent correspondence, deliberately leaving important issues off the strata roll, repeatedly getting the warranty expiry date wrong (and very nearly losing us the entire claim), ordering invalid reports at significant expense and generally just delaying and obfuscating the issue. There’s two issues here; the significant waste caused by their incompetence, or sabotage that has cost the OC well over $200k and 2 years of lost time; and the fact that owners could not do due diligence on the building because important details were hidden from the strata roll and therefore did not show on the strata report.
I certainly would not have bought in the building had they done their job and added prescient information to the records – and this is pretty obvious stuff, like major rectification works going on in a flooded unit for sale, that the owner tried to claim back from the OC. There was/is a significant spreadsheet of defects, and the ‘schedule of works’ to fix another showing it being resolved, was complete fantasy and the people in question hadn’t even been engaged to proceed.
What are the legal obligations of a strata company and what repercussions are there for this kind of, at best, incompetence?
- This topic was modified 11 months, 1 week ago by .
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It depends what you want. If you simply want the strata manager’s behaviour to be reported, compile your evidence and send it to Fair Trading (there is an online complaint form). If it’s really, really unforgivably bad, someone from Fair Trading will call them up and tell them they’ve been naughty and ask them (nicely) not to do it again.
If the strata manager’s action were unprofessional, dishonest, outside the scope of their contract and have cost you financially (or otherwise), and you can prove it, take your evidence to a strata lawyer and ask them what they think your chances of getting compensation might be.
However, bear in mind that no strata manager in the history of NSW strata has ever been “struck off” or penalised in a meaningful way, just for being really crap at their job. Fraudulent behaviour is another matter entirely and you should talk to a strata lawyer if you think you have a case.
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.
A startling fact to realize is that your Strata Manager comes without need for any level of industry training or minimum understanding of compliance, nor is registered. The company itself might have the usual insurances but the person assigned to your account needs very little in the way of formal training. Industry accreditation is a option but is not a requirement.
Hence the number of issues such as you mention comes with very little recourse other than owners personally knowing the law and the requirements and ensuring these are followed. Left up to the Strata dude you can end up with issues such as you have. Firstly, they look after themself, then, the pander to the committee, then you might get a look in if the first two don’t get in the way or you stand your ground.
Sorry to hear this, but it’s not unusual.
Banks. Superannuation managers, financial advisors are all mandated to be a member of AFCA. We have a criminal syndicate managing TRUST ACCOUNTS in a position of power over peoples homes and the use of their money who have the choice whether their behaviours are governed. The silver lining is we are waking up, educating ourselves on legislation and we’ve had enough! It’s so much bigger that just strata, the trades, the little slap on the wrists by fair trading. A royal commission is imminent.
There should be no surprises about the level of corruption, misconduct and human rights violations that are being reported.
I’ve got acknowledgement that my strata has breached legislative duties and is being dealt with by “appropriate compliance action in accordance with our policies and procedures”.
Great news now I know my rights but so ambiguous as a response to a fraud scenario. I now need to submit an FOI to ensure I know what’s covered in this finding by FT NSWThere’s some confusion here. @minklet is saying that important information is missing from the “strata roll” and so did not appear in a strata report. But the strata roll just holds the name and addresses of the owners of the building. There’s no financial information held there. A strata report is created by other people who comb through all the publicly available records for a strata building, and summarises that, which includes the minutes of AGM’s, Strata Committee Meetings and the like. Strata Managers are often involved in preparing these minutes, but generally they are “agents” and as such, act on the instructions of the Owners Corporation or the Strata Committee. And if its a new building, it gets complicated with the developer and the initial strata committee being involved.
But Strata Managers (in NSW at least) are qualified, and have to hold a current Strata Managers Licence. So some of what @minklet is writing is confusing, and is not what actually happens. Which is not to say that errors were not made, or that malfeasance occurred, but the actual situation is probably not what you think it might be. So you probably need someone who understands the area to now get involved – possibly you could get a strata lawyer to investigate and provide you with an opinion of what your options might be…
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