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At our large scheme in NSW, our anchor points are checked and certified prior to use, which is every 5 years or so. And as you say, certification lasts for 12 months. We do not certify the anchor point on a yearly basis.
Our window cleaners prefer to do their own checks and not third party companies.
Hope this helps.
Yes – depending on your SM agreement. Your Secretary/SM can provide you with a copy.
It is common practice to nominate someone from the strata committee to be the ‘contact’ person (usually the Secretary), and a motion to that effect should be recorded in AGM and/or SC minutes.
By the way, the Chairman of a Strata Committee has no specific role/authority outside of meetings, whilst the Secretary and Treasurer do.
I would suggest that you urgently place a motion on the agenda requesting approval/extension of current contract. You could add your quotes and reasonings so that owners will understand. That way, owners are prepared and fully informed BEFORE the next meeting.
The Secretary/SM cannot refuse to add your motion to the agenda as long as it is worded appropriately and received prior to next agenda.
As well, others may correct me here, but I would have thought that a general meeting is required to terminate a contract – not a committee meeting.
To add to JT’s comments – If you haven’t already, consider enrolling your dog in puppy school. This will not only make sure that the dog will behave properly as it matures, but will support your assertion that he/she is not likely to become a problem and is a suitable companion for you.
In our large scheme in NSW our pet-by-law restricts the size of a pet to 12kgs – so that it can be carried if need be. However, we have also made an exception for a rescue greyhound – permission was restricted to a particular dog and lot and supported by a special-bylaw.
So, if you can ensure (prove) your puppy is well-trained, does not bark, is well-controlled on common property (muzzled, leashed), then you should be able to make a good case to keep your pet. It is unlikely that any NCAT action will go against you unless it is proven the puppy/dog is or is likely to be, a nuisance.
To support any application to NCAT, the person(s) affected by the noise would be best advised to attach a Statutory Declaration setting out how the noise is affecting them – sleep, children, pets, anxiety, stress – come to mind.
Over the last 8 years, our large scheme in NSW has had 7 or 8 flooring/noise issues that have gone to Mediation/NCAT – with mostly good outcomes for all parties. But the means of getting a resolution has been different each time.
On one occasion (which seems similar to yours), the tribunal member turned around a ‘flooring issue’ into a ‘noise’ issue’! by tasking all parties to conduct a simple noise test ourselves -that is, dropping car keys and moving chairs around. Whilst it took some time to get both parties and witnesses together, the result was instant and amazing! The offending floor installer got the shock of his life by the “noise” coming from his apartment and he instantly agreed to remove the hard flooring entirely.
Such a test may not be possible or helpful in your case, but it would certainly show to NCAT that you have made every attempt to resolve the issue and could be part of any ‘negotiation’.
You may also want to consider whether using the ‘noise’ by-law instead of the ‘flooring’ bylaw is a better way to go. Just don’t put them together in one case!
My experience has been that relying on the strict wording of any by-law is fraught.
To clarify – the memorandum has two references to handsets and therefore may be confusing.
The handset “within an individual lot” is the responsibility of the lot owner.
I agree with JT and Strataguru.
We have had two such cases (240+ lot scheme NSW) and in both cases the Secretary of SC sent a letter to the Real Estate Agent who was obliged to disclose in the contract of sale. One sale was withdrawn, and the other went ahead with the new owners removing the floorboards.
Good luck
The short answer is yes – I am not a lawyer, but if experience is a guide, then the trustee can stretch this out and I doubt there is much you can do about it without engaging lawyers. One consideration is whether the ‘bankruptcy’ is voluntary or not.
One of our owners (in a large scheme in NSW) turned an $18,000 debt in levies to over $100,000 debt in levies/legals/interest in just over a year! The OC eventually got all their monies (plus interest) back but I still shake my head at the stupidity and nonsense of it all.
Good luck
I agree with Jimmy – but add that you need to also find out whether there is a by-law that covers installation of a/c. The bylaw would cover noise from the unit, water drips, location of condenser, damage to common property during installation etc.
I can not add anything to whether the floating ceiling is ‘common property’ or not, although I too was under the impression they were ‘common property’.
However, if our scheme is any guide – a floating ceiling is a sound barrier to noise from above.
We have had sound engineers crawling all over our scheme for years – and those apartments without floating ceilings (below) never pass a sound test and are prohibited from installing hard flooring.
Surely wboever told you had to move should have provided the answer at the same time they ask you to move…..!?
At our scheme – undergoing millions of dollars of repairs – there was an allowance to move owners/tenants for about 6 weeks. The allowance equated to current rent value.
At our scheme in NSW, where we needed to raise about $5 million over 3-5 years, we elected to have a steady increase of about 8% per year in Capital Works Fund – knowing that may leave us with a possible short fall. However, we also knew that capital works do not always run to schedule – and that has turned out to be the case. So our remediation plan is already a year behind – no fault of anyone, just a big job – but that has given us all a breather.
We have also decided to consider a loan if monies turn out to be insufficient rather than a special levy. But time will tell on that one.
Special levies should be for urgent matters only.
In NSW you can ‘instruct’ your proxy to vote a certain way. The proxy form you received should make this clear.
Since the by-law you are concerned about will be a ‘special resolution’ the minutes will (should) record the vote of each lot and you can then check that your wishes were carried out.