This article is about lodging complaints with the Commissioner’s office.
Question: Can an individual owner lodge a complaint with the Commissioner’s office if the PBC breaches the legislation?
We live in a retirement village with 170 lots comprising four stages. It is a layered scheme with four body corporate committees (one for each stage) and a principal body corporate (PBC). The PBC is one member (chairperson) from each stage. The stage committees seem rather irrelevant, as the PBC makes all the decisions. Until I brought it up, the PBC wasn’t distributing minutes to the stage committees. I find it strange that the PBC (4 people) makes all decisions involving a large sum of owners’ levies. Can you confirm that an individual owner does not have the right to lodge a complaint with the Commissioner’s office if the PBC is breaching the legislation? How do I lodge a complaint against a PBC with the Commissioner in QLD? If my understanding is correct, only a stage committee can do this.
Answer: Only recently, individuals (occupiers) in subsidiaries have the option to pursue dispute resolution under certain circumstances.
As you probably know, different pieces of legislation regulate both retirement villages and bodies corporate. While we cannot comment on how the retirement villages legislation may (or may not) apply to your situation, you may like to contact the relevant section of the Department of Housing – more information is at this link: Getting help in retirement villages
With your specific strata issues, your understanding of things was correct until recently. From 1 May 2024, strata legislation changed in relation to layered scheme matters. Now, individuals (occupiers) in the subsidiaries do indeed have the option to pursue dispute resolution under certain circumstances. For example, they can do so in relation to records searches, while occupiers in the subsidiaries can also be subject to by-law enforcement from the principal. You might like to contact the Commissioner’s Office on 1800 060 119, in the first instance, for further information.
For what it is worth, we agree the arrangements for layered schemes are indeed rather odd. We wonder if there is also some confusion about the overlap with retirement villages legislation contributing to the issue you are facing: it certainly would not be the first time we have heard of that happening. That said, it’s worth remembering that each subsidiary still has its own obligations to comply with strata legislation, including provisions for setting budgets.
This is general information only and not legal advice.
Chris Irons
Strata Solve
E: [email protected]
P: 0419 805 898
This post appears in the April 2025 edition of The QLD Strata Magazine.
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This article has been republished with permission from the author and first appeared on the Mahoneys website.
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