Have you received a ‘land access notice’ from a telecommunications carrier demanding access to inspect or to install telecommunications equipment on your community title scheme land?

You may have experienced some pretty bullish tactics from those providers. For example, land access notices requiring permanent access to your land to install telecommunications equipment, offering little or no compensation.

It’s even worse when those installations could cause a detrimental effect including obstructing views, affecting the aesthetic appearance of the building or compromising privacy.
Telecommunications carriers wanting access to inspect land or to install telecommunications equipment must give at least 10 business days written notice of their intention to do so to the owner and occupiers of the land (for example tenants). The notice must detail the intended activity, proposed location for the installation and the land owner and occupiers’ rights.

It’s important to be aware:
1. if you have any rights to formally object to the notice or a right to compensation; and
2. how to best negotiate with the provider.

There are strict rules in relation to the timing and process for submitting objections. If those are not complied with you may compromise your rights.

Objections that can’t be resolved between the parties can be referred to the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman within certain time frames. Those time frames also need to be considered against the time frames under the Body Corporate and Community Management Act 1997 where the property is strata titled; any decisions by the Committee or the owners in a general meeting need to be properly made in compliance with the legislation.

At Stratum Legal, we have helped many clients, including Bodies Corporate, deal with land access notices. In almost all cases we have helped our clients negotiate favorable outcomes.
Contact us if you would like to understand more about your rights and / or the carriers’ rights. We can also advise you on ways the use of your land can be structured to set you up with the best grounds for objecting to future land access notice you may receive and to maximise the compensation you may be entitled to.

This article was contributed by Michael Kleinschmidt, Stratum Legal.