In a strata building, fire safety is shared between several groups of people, and that is how things get missed. Everyone assumes someone else has it covered.
This is a general outline of who usually does what. It is not legal advice. The specifics depend on your building, your scheme and your agreements, and the NSW Government website is the place to check the rules.
The owners corporation
The owners corporation is all of the lot owners together. It usually owns the common property, and that tends to include the things that matter most in a fire: corridors, stairs, exit doors, car parks and shared equipment such as hose reels, extinguishers, exit lighting and alarms.
Because it owns them, the owners corporation is generally responsible for keeping them maintained and for the records that go with them. The committee makes the working decisions: approving servicing, approving repairs and setting money aside.
The point to hold onto is that the responsibility stays with the owners, even when the work is handed to others.
The strata manager
A strata manager works for the owners corporation under an agreement. In practice the manager is usually the organiser, the one who books contractors, keeps the records, chases quotes, tracks dates and puts decisions in front of the committee.
What a manager does comes down to that agreement, so the committee should know which fire safety tasks have been handed over and which have not. In a self-managed scheme, all of it sits with the committee.
The fire contractor
The contractor does the hands-on work. That means inspecting, testing and servicing the equipment, reporting on its condition and carrying out repairs once they are approved.
A contractor should tell you plainly:
- what was checked and what was not
- what failed and why
- what the repair involves
- what falls outside their scope and needs someone else
Depending on the measure, there are rules about who is allowed to check it and sign it off. Ask any contractor what they can and cannot do for your building. Fire Protection Association Australia has general information on how the industry is organised.
Residents, owners and tenants
The people living in the building don’t service anything, but they affect its fire safety every day.
- Keep corridors, stairs and landings clear. Bikes, prams, shoe racks and pot plants in a shared corridor are sitting in the way out.
- Leave fire doors closed, and ask before altering the front door of a unit. It may be a fire door.
- Look after the smoke alarms inside the unit and never cover or disable them.
- Report damage, such as a broken door closer, a dark exit sign or a missing extinguisher.
- Give access when a service visit is booked.
Who looks after items inside a lot, such as a unit’s smoke alarm or front door, varies between schemes. The strata manager can tell you.
Everyone in the building should know the way out, and that in an emergency you call Triple Zero (000).
Where it goes wrong
The gaps tend to be the same from one building to the next:
- the strata manager changes and the records don’t come across
- defects are reported but never approved for repair
- a renovation inside a lot disturbs a fire door, a wall or an alarm
- nobody on the committee has read the last report
A simple habit that helps
Make fire safety a standing item on the committee agenda. Keep one folder holding the reports, the defects and what was done about each, and make sure more than one person can get to it.
V&H Fire Group can work with owners corporations and strata managers between the Central Coast and Newcastle on compliance and the servicing that sits behind it. Byron is happy to talk a building through on 0483 371 134.
This article is general information, not advice for your building. For what applies to your premises, talk to us on site.
