QLD: Who retains the fees paid when an owner pays to access body corporate records?

Question: Who retains the fees paid when an owner pays a fee to access body corporate records?

The QLD BCCM Act requires that the body corporate must do either or both of the following as requested by a person —

1. permit the person to inspect the body corporate’s records;
2. give the person a copy of a record kept by the body corporate.

The applicable fees are:

1. To inspect the records $19.35.
2. For a copy, the fee is $0.70 a page.

The person wanting to inspect or obtain a copy must write to the body corporate, ask for documents or an inspection, and pay the correct fee. The body corporate cannot charge any other costs, e.g. a charge for the body corporate manager’s time.

The BCCM Act does not appear to state whether a body corporate manager (BCM), to whom applications are usually made and fees paid, can retain the fee or whether the fee should be remitted to the body corporate. In the case of a large body corporate, payments for copies of documents and/or inspections could amount to thousands of dollars per annum.

Should these payments to the BCM be accounted for, retained by the BCM or remitted to the body corporate?

Answer: The records are the body corporate’s records, not the manager’s, so the legislated fees for searching and copying them would go to the body corporate.

Let’s look closely at those legislative provisions. The legislation refers to ‘the body corporate’ in the context of records access. It does not refer to an agent or other party. Indeed, the body corporate is expressly forbidden from contracting out.

In other words, while the body corporate manager plays an essential role in the affairs of a body corporate, the body corporate retains decision-making powers and control over its funds – including receipt of such funds. It is their money. In this case, the fee is payable to ‘the body corporate’. Put another way: the records are the body corporate’s records – not the manager’s records – so the legislated fees for searching and copying them would go to the body corporate.

Here, you may be thinking about expenses incurred by the body corporate manager in relation to actioning the records request. Those particular expenses are not regulated by strata legislation. They are subject to the terms of the contract between the body corporate manager and the body corporate. If, for example, the contract says the body corporate will charge the body corporate $500 per hour plus GST to do the necessary work to comply with a records request, that’s what the contract says. It is separate from the prescribed fees you have quoted.

While you don’t specifically refer to this issue, I’ll address it anyway as it is relevant: the individual requesting the records pays only those regulated fees prescribed by legislation. They do not pay the body corporate manager’s disbursements if they apply.

Reading between the lines, perhaps you are concerned about how much your body corporate pays in relation to records requests. Fair enough. That said, the fact remains that there is an express right for an ‘interested party’ to obtain records. Adjudicators take a pretty strong view on accessing records and if there are a lot of records requests. Perhaps the body corporate could consider whether their records are being transparently provided in the first place.

This is general information only and not legal advice.

Chris Irons
Strata Solve
E: chris@stratasolve.com.au
P: 0419 805 898