Strata & Office Plumbing in Western Sydney, Documented Properly.
Risers, plant-room hot water, accessible bathrooms across floors, end-of-trip facilities and tenant fit-out coordination. The difference in strata work is not the plumbing, it is the paperwork and knowing whose cost it is before anyone starts. We attend with certificates of currency already on file, a SWMS where the site needs one, and a report the committee can actually read.
Lot owner or owners corporation?
Almost every delayed strata plumbing job is delayed by this, not by the plumbing. Here is the general rule, and the honest limits of it.
The owners corporation is responsible for repairing and maintaining common property. The lot owner is responsible for what is inside their lot. That duty on the owners corporation sits in section 106 of the Strata Schemes Management Act 2015 (NSW).
For plumbing, the practical dividing line is usually where the pipe sits and how many lots it serves. Pipes running inside common property walls, floors or ceilings are generally common property, and so is the main stopcock to a unit. Pipework inside the lot serving only that lot, and the fixtures themselves, are generally the owner’s. A pipe serving more than one lot is far more likely to be common property than one serving a single unit.
The general rule is not the answer for your building. The strata plan and the by-laws decide it, and a common property rights by-law can move a duty onto a lot owner that would otherwise sit with the owners corporation. NSW publishes a common property memorandum that many schemes adopt, which sets the split out item by item. Check those three documents before anyone commits to a cost.
| What has failed | Usually whose | What decides it |
|---|---|---|
| Pipe inside a common property wall or floor slab | Owners corporation | Location. Inside common property structure is generally common property. |
| The main stopcock to a unit | Owners corporation | Listed as a common property item in the NSW common property memorandum. |
| A stack or riser serving several lots | Owners corporation | Serves more than one lot, so it is shared infrastructure. |
| Tap, mixer, toilet or basin inside the lot | Lot owner | Fixtures within the lot are the owner’s, not the scheme’s. |
| Pipework inside the lot serving only that lot | Lot owner | Location, plus how many lots it serves. |
| Hot water unit dedicated to one apartment | Usually lot owner | Depends where it sits. A plant-room unit serving the building is a different answer entirely. |
| Waterproofing membrane in a lot bathroom | Commonly disputed | Often ends up common property as original building structure, and it is not a plumbing trade in any case. |
What we look after in a building.
Residential strata, commercial office floors and mixed-use. The work splits into scheduled maintenance, reactive callouts, and the fit-out work that lands whenever a tenant changes.
Riser and stack maintenance
Shared stacks are where one lot’s problem becomes everyone’s. Scheduled jetting of the main lines, inspection openings kept accessible and marked, and a record of what was cleared and when, so a recurring stack has a history rather than a rumour.
Plant-room hot water
Central hot water plant serving multiple lots or floors. Tempering valve checks, circulation and return faults, relief valve replacement, and the failures that show up as no hot water on the top floor and nowhere else.
Accessible bathrooms across floors
Grab rail fixings into the right substrate, pan set-outs and heights that meet the standard, and tempered water where it is required. Getting this wrong is an access compliance problem, not only a plumbing one.
End-of-trip facilities
Showers, changing rooms and the drainage that goes with them. Heavy morning peak loads, high fixture density, and a hot water demand curve that looks nothing like a residential building.
Tenant fit-out coordination
Rough-in and fit-off for an incoming tenancy, capping off what the outgoing one left behind, and making sure the new tea point or bathroom is connected to something that can carry it. We work as the plumbing lead alongside the builder.
Backflow compliance
Buildings with a commercial kitchen, a cooling tower or an irrigation system usually own a testable backflow device, and often nobody on site knows it exists. Annual testing and lodgement with the water authority. More on our backflow page.
What a strata manager actually needs from a plumber.
Mostly not plumbing. Mostly the ability to attend without three phone calls, and paperwork that survives a committee meeting.
Access sorted once.
Key or fob arrangements, after-hours access, loading dock and lift booking rules, and who the on-site contact is. We set this up when the account starts rather than rediscovering it on every attendance.
Attend and establish whose it is.
Before the repair, we work out whether the fault sits in common property or in the lot, and we put that in writing. That determination is what lets a manager raise the right work order against the right party without guessing.
Make safe, then quote the repair.
Stop the damage on the first attendance. Anything beyond making safe gets quoted before it proceeds, because a committee generally cannot approve a spend it has not seen a number for.
Report with photographs.
What was found, what was done, what remains, and images. Written so it can be forwarded to an owner or tabled at a meeting without translation.
Invoice the right party.
Split correctly where a job crosses the boundary, referenced to the lot or the common property item, so it reconciles against the work order rather than starting an argument three weeks later.
The paperwork that comes as standard.
NSW plumbing and gas licence 309265C, current, on the public record and quotable in a committee minute. Certificates of currency for public liability, supplied before we attend rather than after someone asks. A SWMS where the site or the work requires one.
Compliance certificates are issued where the job calls for them, including a Gas Compliance Certificate on any gasfitting work, which in NSW must be lodged through the BCNSW eCert portal within five business days. An emailed PDF of a paper form is no longer lodgement.
Twelve month workmanship guarantee on parts and labour. Where a job crosses the common property boundary, the invoice is split against the correct party rather than issued as one line for someone else to unpick.
What managers and committees ask us.
Direct answers from a licensed NSW plumber. General information about the usual position, not legal advice about your scheme.
Who pays for a burst pipe in a strata unit, the owner or the owners corporation?
Can you tell us whose responsibility it is before you do the repair?
Do you carry insurance and provide certificates of currency?
Our building has a device we were told needs annual testing. What is that?
One apartment has no hot water but the rest of the building is fine.
Do you do the waterproofing on a leaking bathroom?
Can you hold a standing account for a portfolio of buildings?
- Strata Schemes Management Act 2015 (NSW) — section 106, the owners corporation duty to maintain and repair common property.
- NSW Government · Strata repairs and maintenance — how common property and lot property are distinguished in practice.
- NSW Government · Common property memorandum — the item-by-item split many schemes adopt, including pipes and the main stopcock.
- NSW Government · Gasfitter compliance obligations — certificate lodgement requirements for gasfitting work.
Strata Plumbing in Penrith: One Plumber Who Knows Your Building.
Tell us the site, the access arrangement and what keeps recurring. We will tell you honestly whether we have the capacity to look after it properly, and what a standing account would cover.