Question: With no onsite manager, a resident acts as the point of contact. She holds keys and meets tradies. Is this a reasonable arrangement?
We have no onsite manager, all committee members are investors and don’t live in the complex, and our Body Corporate Manager is approx 30kms away.
The Body Corporate Manager has organised for one of the resident owners to act as a main point of contact for tradies. She has not been officially appointed as the onsite manager, however, she keeps keys for some areas of common property that others do not have. There are no minutes about this matter.
Can be the scheme managed like this?
Answer: For that owner, this arrangement puts them under a fair bit of responsibility and even potential liability, and I do wonder if this has been considered.
Yes – in a word.
Here’s the more elaborate reply: in your case, given the challenges of having someone on site, it seems – I stress, ‘seems’ – like what might be occurring is the best outcome you can probably get.
That said, all the more reason to try to be as process-oriented as possible: proper decision-making, with minutes, communicated as they need to be. If the owner in question has a contract, or anything resembling a contract, then she may fall under the legislative definition for a ‘service contractor’. I can’t quite tell from your query either way. Quite apart from anything else, it appears the owner is in possession of body corporate assets (the keys) and seems to have exclusive access to parts of the scheme (common property or otherwise), and really, that issue needs to be resolved as a priority. That is not something that can simply be informally arranged or decided by one person. For that owner, that puts them under a fair bit of responsibility and even potential liability, and I do wonder if they have thought about that clearly. Perhaps it is something you can have a discussion with them about.
This post appears in the September 2022 edition of The QLD Strata Magazine.
Chris Irons Strata Solve E: chris@stratasolve.com.au P: 0419 805 898