 Hello and welcome to this Tenancy Information webinar for Park Managers. This webinar is a collaboration between Residential Tenancy Authority and Caravan in Queensland. I'm Valentina Dimosca and I'm a Senior Community Education Officer with the Residential Tenancy Authority and I'm joined by Ellen Mung from Caravan in Queensland. Hi, Ellen. Hi, Valentina. Hello, everyone. Today, Ellen and I will be looking at a number of topics in this session and we'll be looking at things to consider before the tenancy commences, the starting of a tenancy, during and ending a tenancy, some specific topics that have been raised with either Ellen or myself over the years from Park Managers. We'll talk a little bit about RTA Dispute Resolution Service, the Queensland Civil and Administrative Tribunal, and give you a bit of information about RTA's investigations and compliance process. Today, our discussion will be around your obligations and what you need to know in terms of the Residential Tenancies and Rooming Accommodation Act, or the Act, or RTA Act as we call it. One of the first things to keep in mind is that both holiday-letting and manufactured homes are not covered by the Act. But once you've established that and you are accepting a tenancy that's either short term or longer term, there are a couple of things you need to keep in mind even before the tenancy starts. And one of them is to make sure that the caravan or site that you're renting out is clean and in good repair. The locks and security devices are in good working order. There's a full set of keys for one tenant and an entry key for the other tenants, and that there are contact details for the tenant if there's an emergency. Remember, you also have an obligation to not be in breach of any health or safety laws. For example, there's a section in the Electrical Safety and Regulation Act that stipulates that all residential caravans in Queensland must be fitted with a working safety switch. So it's very important to ensure that you're complying with all the relevant legislation. Once you are starting a tenancy, there's two options. There's the short term tenants or a long term tenancy and the tenant decide which one they're entering into. Now, a short term agreement or short term tenancy, a written agreement isn't required but it is recommended. There's no formal one through the RTI but it is recommended that you do one. But you must also give the tenant a copy of the park rules and a copy of the pocket guide for tenants in caravan parks. With long term agreements, you do need to give a written agreement to the tenant and it's called the Form 18B and that will include by standard terms and special terms. And you must also give the tenant a pocket guide for tenants in caravan parks and an entry condition report. You may give them an entry condition report for moveable dwellings and you may also, if a bond is taken, you'll have to go through the bond lodgment process with them and you may fill out a hard copy for more. Look at one online in the RTI and lodge it that way. Alan, with the paperwork that I've mentioned so far, would you consider that that is quite critical? Yes, Valentina. Look, having no paperwork causes problems. You need to be able to identify three types of people will be coming into a caravan park generally will be a tourist, someone looking for some short term accommodation and someone looking to stay more permanently with long term accommodation. Some parks are still only issuing just a site receipt and that's not enough to show which of those three things a person is when they're coming into a park. So you've got to have paperwork that will show the grounds that the person is allowed to enter the park. If there's a problem down the track, you need to be able to show a third party such as the police or QCAT what the intent of the arrangement was. Okay, so keep that in mind. As frustrating as paperwork can be sometimes, it is very important. Absolutely, 100%. With starting the tenancy and the tenancy agreement in particular, it's important to keep in mind that you need to fill that out with all the relevant information so that both you and the tenant are clear about what you're agreeing to for the rest of the tenancy. The agreement needs to include the name and address of the tenant and yourself, the starting and end dates and whether the agreement is a periodic or a fixed term agreement. Oh, and also in terms of the rent, how much is it? How should it be paid? And also the services that must be paid for gas, electricity, sewerage, water, and having all that upfront actually reduces disputes in the end, doesn't it? Absolutely, yeah. As long as everybody can see what they're entering into and everybody agrees to what's on that document so it's very clear who's required to pay for what. These are all the standard terms in the agreement and it is important to have all those details there. Equally and even more important is to be very clear about the special terms. Special terms may include details about pets, rent increases, charging for utilities, and pest control. Be clear about the special terms you are putting in and check with either the RTA or CPAQ that your special terms are compliant. The other important part of the tenancy agreement is in fact the park rules. They form part of the agreement and you need to give a copy of those to the tenant before taking any money from them or signing anything that commits them to the agreement. Alan, do you find that there's a bit of confusion around amongst caravan parks around park rules? Yeah, I do, Valentina. Sometimes people think that there is an endless list of park rules but anything that they want as a park rule within their environment, they can include that on a document. Unfortunately the legislation is very clear about what can and what can't be a park rule. It's things like how the parks, common areas, play areas, swimming pools and toilet blocks can be used, how much noise people can make and at what times, where and when any sporting or recreational activities can occur. Speed limits for cars and other vehicles and where cars and other vehicles can be parked. The disposal of rubbish and where the pets can be kept. So there's a very defined set of rules as stated in the legislation and you can't just go making a park rule about anything that you would like because that wouldn't comply with the law. Now, some of you may decide that you do wish to take a bond. There's no requirement to take a bond. However, if you do take a bond, the maximum that you can take is two weeks or if you're charging electricity, the maximum you can take is three weeks. You must give the tenant a receipt straight away after you've taken their bond money and also lodged the bond with the RTA within 10 days. You have two options for lodging that bond. You can fill in a bond lodgment form, a form tooth that you and the tenant sign and then lodge with the RTA within 10 days or either you or the tenant can lodge the bond with the RTA online. There's four easy steps to lodging a bond online with the RTA. You go to the RTA website, follow the link to QGov registration. Once you register, you'll be asked to accept the terms and conditions and complete the lodgment details and pay by credit card, debit card or BPAY. There are many information resources on the RTA website to assist you in this process and you can also call the RTA contact centre where support officers can walk you through the process. Now that we've covered some key aspects of starting a tenancy, we're going to go into during a tenancy. Now one of the things during a tenancy is that you may need to do is to enter a premises. It's very important that you're aware that there's rules of entry that are outlined in the legislation as to when you can enter, why you can enter and how much notice you have to give before you enter. You have the right to enter a rent of caravan to inspect it or to carry out maintenance, routine inspections or to show a prospective tenant the caravan or site. However, you also have an obligation to not interfere with the tenant's reasonable peace, comfort and privacy. In most cases, you must give the tenant appropriate notice with an entry notice of 4.9. However, no notice is required in the case of an emergency or if the tenant agrees. Something else that often comes up during a tenancy may be breaches. Breaches are in fact breaks of the agreement and they can be done by either the tenant or the park manager. So breaches may include rent arrears, noise complaints, damage, unapproved pets or unapproved occupants. When you have found the tenant has breached the agreement, you have a number of options. You can communicate with them and reach an agreement with them about how that breach can be remedied, how they can fix the problem. In the example of rent arrears, you may be able to reach an agreement with them that they may not be able to fix it straight away, but they may be paying you back over time. But you need to put that in writing. If you feel that the tenant may benefit from support from other organisations, whether it's a neighbourhood centre or a rent connect program, you may decide to refer them to somewhere so they can have some assistance to be able to remedy that breach. Or you may decide that the best way to do that if neither of these have worked is to give them a notice to remedy breach and that will notify them that they have made a breach of the tenancy agreement or the park rules and that they need to fix that by a certain time. Again, a reminder that a notice to remedy breach can be issued by either the park manager or by the tenant. So what happens if you have given a tenant a notice to remedy breach and you've given them a timeframe and they haven't rectified the breach? They haven't remedied the breach. You have the option of giving them a notice to leave and in the case of where the tenant has given you a breach notice and you haven't remedied the breach, they can give you a notice of intention to leave. The other option is that either of you, the tenant or the park manager, can apply to the RTA for its free, dis-brief resolution service and they will be able to assist you to try and resolve the matter. In some cases the breach may be rectified but then a little bit later on the same breach happens again. What are some of these situations? Well, it's not unusual in a caravan park, Valentina, for people to keep doing the same thing over and over. A good example would be excessive noise. It could be rent arrears or they might be driving too quickly on numerous occasions in the park. So with a breach notice, you can issue it initially. If they fix the problem up within the allowed timeframe then that one goes away. Two months later they do the same thing again, issue a breach notice and again they stop doing that thing within the allowed timeframe so that one goes away. If on a third occasion within the 12 month period you have to issue a breach notice for the same thing, immediately after you have issued that third breach notice, you do not issue a Form 12 notice to leave. You make an application to QCAT for an urgent application for a termination of that person's tenancy under the grounds of repeated breaches. Ending a tenancy. So a tenancy can end in a number of different ways and there's a particular section in the Act that outlines the number of different ways by which a tenancy can end. Some of those are that you give the tenant notice to leave, that the tenant gives you a notice of intention to leave or that the tenant abandons the caravan or site. Another one is that both may mutually agree in writing to end the tenancy or you or the tenant can apply to QCAT for an order to end the tenancy and the final one is that the tenant may die. For all of these types of endings to tenant, timeframes do apply so it's important to look into the legislation to speak to the RTA to go on our website or to talk with CPAQ to be clear about the timeframes for notices for each of these and what to do around each situation. So when a tenancy does end the tenant has to return the premises in the same condition was at the start of the tenancy, less fair wear and tear of course and both you and the tenant also need to complete an excellent condition report and in your case and the tenant's case take some photos of evidence particularly if you feel you will need some evidence with regard to damage and so forth if there will be a dispute about a bond for example. The quickest way for bond refund is an agreed refund so that's where both you and the tenant agree that they may get the whole bond back or that you may keep some of that bond because of it could be for whatever reason could be some damage that was done and if both of you agree you can both sign a hard copy and send that in or you can go to our website and apply for a bond refund through the fast track process through our new web services at the RTA. So again staying with the ending of a tenancy we mentioned earlier in the presentation that one of the ways a tenancy can end is through abandonment so if a park manager believes on reasonable grounds that the premises is abandoned they may enter the premises by giving an entry notice and allowing 24 hours notice before going in to inspect the premises. Ellen, what would some of the reasonable grounds be? People will quite often, Valentina, look at whether the person has been at the site whether they've stopped paying their rent whether there's been any activity at the caravan and its caravan parks are fairly small environments so it will be generally quite obvious to a caravan park manager if a vehicle has been abandoned. It happens fairly regularly but if you do believe and what the law says is on reasonable grounds so for any of those things you suspect are happening then you can reasonably assume that the person has taken off and that the property has been abandoned. So you have two options you can issue an abandonment termination notice or you can apply to QCAT for an order to end the tenancy on the grounds of abandonment. So applying to QCAT for an order it really is very important that when you are inspecting the property or deciding that it's abandoned that you take photos, keep some evidence write everything down because they will ask for evidence as to why you think that the property has been abandoned and the tenancy needs to end. Another issue that comes up at the end of a tenancy in some cases is what happens with goods and documents that may have been left behind particularly if a caravan has been abandoned. So there's a number of rules around disposing of goods. Goods and documents left behind after a tenant has moved out must be returned or disposed of according to a specific set of rules goods may only be dealt with once the tenancy agreement has ended so you have to establish that it has ended and that the goods have been abandoned. And personal documents in particular such as cash, passports, birth certificates, photographs must be given to the tenant or if you can't contact them to the public trustee within seven days of ending the tenancy you must make an effort to contact the tenant about these items. There's also detailed information on our RTA website as to how to dispose of goods valued at less than $1,500 and those valued at more than $1,500 because there's quite specific rules about that in the act and you can also find out what to do for caravan and its contents have been left behind. Another issue that is related to the ending of a tenancy is the deaths of a soul tenant. Ellen, have you found this to be an issue on caravan parks in caravan parks? It does happen, Valentina. It's not super common. Several times a year we'll get a call from a park saying that a resident has deceased in the park and check with us what the process is and what they should do. So obviously the first thing that people would do would notify the police and let them do their job. When it comes to the caravan and the belongings of the person, really you should only be dealing with the executor of the estate or a lawful representative of the deceased. It has been known to happen that people will turn up and state that they are the son or the daughter or the brother or the cousin of the deceased and that they gave them a TV or a fridge or a mattress or something else as a gift recently and they just want to get that out of the caravan and ask for permission to enter the caravan. We would suggest that park managers should not let those people enter the caravan. If you do and they take those belongings and they aren't an authorised person, it has been the case where a park manager has been held liable for the cost of those items. So just ensure you're dealing with the right people and that's the executor or the lawful representative of the deceased. And similarly with RTA's bond claims, RTA does require notification from an executor of a tenant in the estate or an authorised person in order to deal with bond briefings. So we come to some specific topics, Alan, that you've come across in your work with caravan parks. Would you like to discuss some of these in a bit more detail? Yeah, sure, Valentina. Some of the things that do come up in caravan parks, they are close living environments and you've generally got a lot of people contained in a small space. So things like neighbour versus neighbour disputes can come up and that generally comes down to a personality clash between people and they got in each other's nerves a little bit and it can escalate somewhat. And quite often one or both of those parties will expect that the caravan park manager will do something about it. The situation is the same as if you were living in a house side by side. The caravan park manager doesn't need to become involved, that two parties need to sort it out themselves. However, if their behaviour between the two of them becomes such that it interferes with the peace, comfort and privacy of the other residents in the park, then either of those parties can be issued with a notice to remedy breach. Other things happen like you might get drug activity or some other form of unlawful activity in a park. There can be matters of serious nuisance where someone is displaying behaviour that is unreasonable or threatening or... Objectionable. Objectionable. You can contact the police. They do have the powers to remove somebody from a park for up to 24 hours if they think that's the appropriate action to take. Yeah, that's right, Ellen. And as well as calling the police, you can make an urgent application to QCAT for an order to end a tenancy on the grounds of a tenant's objectionable behaviour. You can also apply to QCAT for an order to exclude a person, even if they're not a tenant of the park for up to a year because of their behaviour. One of the things we did bring up early in the webinar was what happens when there's a breach where either party has broken their agreement and sometimes when a breach has happened, there's a bit of a disagreement about whether a breach, even if it has happened, and the disagreement between both the tenant and the park manager. So in those sort of situations, the RTA looks at resolving disputes as a three-step process. We recommend, as a first, that you try to resolve the matter between each other as the second step. If you can't resolve it that way, that either you or the tenant apply to the RTA for a free dispute resolution service. And if that still doesn't resolve it, we would give you a notice of unresolved dispute and you would go to the Queensland Civil and Administrative Tribunal, which is QCAT. So when trying to resolve a disagreement between yourself and the tenant, it's important to have some good, clear communication to state what you think the problem is, how it can be fixed, what you would like to happen, what's the outcome you want. And to also be very clear about what your rights and obligations are under the Act so that then you can focus on the fact those steps are very important and it's also important to look at what are the options available to you and to the tenant. If that doesn't work, you can apply to the RTA for dispute resolution. You can do that through filling out a form 16 or if it's about a bond dispute, if you can't agree as to how much of the bond you are keeping due to damage, et cetera, you can apply for a dispute within the bond refund process online. So when you contact the RTA, it's important to remember that the conciliator is impartial and the whole thing is a confidential process. Most disputes are resolved or dealt with through the phone so the conciliation process happens through phone conversations and the conciliator is looking to get you and the tenant to come to an agreement that you will both own. They're not looking to say who's right or who's wrong. The RTA does not have the power to make such decisions. We are there to help you to resolve the issue to come to an agreement and then we get you to put that into writing. If, however, you don't come to an agreement and the issue isn't resolved, we would give you a notice of unresolved dispute and you would have the option to take that to Queensland civil administrative tribunal where they have the power to make a decision. For more information on QCAT and how to apply, go to their website qcat.qld.gov.au up on their screen. We can't emphasise enough how important it is to actually make sure you have all your evidence with you. Elle, would you agree there that it's vital that people bring everything with them? Absolutely, Valentina. The referee or the adjudicator, they're hearing many, many cases in one day. They don't like to muck around. They like to get a very, very clear picture of why people are there. They like to get a very clear picture of each person's point of view. They like to have very clear and concise bullet-pointed documents and information, photographs, any records that you can provide and support your argument and your point of view is what they're looking for. You need to be clear, you need to be concise and you need to be able to speak to the referee in a way that they can very, very easily understand what's going on. The RTI has done a webinar in the past with QCAT adjudicators and if you need more information, please watch the video and also go to the QCAT website. In addition to our dispute resolution service, the RTI also investigates offences against the act. These offences are sections of the act which have penalty points next to them. An example is not lodging a bond. Has penalty points attached to it? Unlawful entry has penalty points attached to it. When such offences become known to the RTI an investigation is conducted and this investigation is an impartial fact-gathering process. There is sometimes confusion about the difference between disputes and investigations or breaches and offences. Disputes are about breaches of the tenancy agreement and therefore they're civil matters and they are heard in QCAT whereas offences are criminal matters and they are heard in the magistrate court. When a complaint about an offence against the act comes to the RTI the investigations unit look at a number of different options for dealing with that complaint once it's substantiated and they are firstly to provide education to issue a warning letter, to issue a PIN which is a fine or to commence a prosecution. So it's important to understand your obligations and particularly to be aware of the parts of the act that do have penalty points attached to them and if you do find yourself in a situation where there has been a complaint about your particular park or yourself to be aware of this process and that matters don't necessarily go into prosecution but they can. That reminder to be aware of your obligations under the act leads us very nicely to the end of this webinar. Certainly if you have any questions or doubts or uncertainness to what your rights obligations are for a particular situation please don't hesitate to contact the RTI at the number on your screen or to go to our website and look at the resources there or to contact Caravanning Queensland. Absolutely Valentina we'd love to hear from people just give us a call in the office and it doesn't matter what your question is check in with us and we'll help you out. Thank you very much for your time.