Section 71 breaches

Daphne – each income and expenditure statement is relative to the approved budget for each Fund (Admin and Sinking), so irrespective of whether they’re complex or simple one page documents any variance (over or under) will still be identified at the proverbial bottom-line.

As for your Owners Corporation (O/C) borrowing from its Sinking Fund in order to make payments that should otherwise have been made from its Administrative Fund, under Sect 71(3) of the NSW Strata Schemes Management Act it (the O/C) had 3 months from the date of the initial transfer to determine how the borrowed funds will be re-paid and over what timeframe.

The S109 Certificate that you requested relates only to financial and other matters to do with your Lot, not the the O/C as a whole, and an Audit only looks at how the financial records have been kept and how income’s raised and payments made.

So as for what you and other Owners should do about the current situation.

It’s too often the case that despite the efforts of (some) Strata Managers to have levy contributions set at levels sufficient to meet anticipated expenses, (some) Owners never want to pay any more than they have to, consequently get themselves into the situation that you describe, eventually find themselves with insufficient funds to properly manage their Plan, and then have to borrow (sound familiar!).

One option is to elect a new Government, sorry Executive Committee, who’s prepared to push-through the necessary levy increases, and another is to do what Jimmy suggested (post #2) and seek Orders to compulsorily vary the amount of your O/C’s levy contributions under Sect 149 of that Act.