Any advice on this one please?

Hi Everyone,

I'm new and just finding my way around !

I live in Fuerteventura where corruption is alive and well and thriving nicely, thank you   Unfortunately it is also alive and well in the Community where I live !

If anyone has experienced the following and can offer any advice as to how best to deal with it, I would be really grateful !

In our Community, we all have our own seperate water meters. The meters are read monthly by the community maintenance man who passes the readings to the community office who then pass them to the water company. The water company then sends the Community office one total invoice with a breakdown for each individual owner and for community water. The Community then collects the water fee together with the Community fee via direct debit from each owner.

This system, although a bit odd, has always seemed to work well and has never been a problem.............until Friday !!!

On Friday, we all received a notice from the water company promising cut-off in 48 hours if the Community water debt of 10,500 euros was not paid !!!!

Immediate enquiries of the Community office revealed that all was well because the water company had been given a series of post-dated cheques and cut-off had been averted !!!

I smelled big rats here, cos, obviously, the Community have taken water money from each owner each month so why have to resort to post-dated cheques??

This morning hub and I decided to go directly to the water company office to get to the bottom of it !!  Our worst fears were confirmed when we were told that our Community had not paid any water money since February !!!!!!

So..........what have they done with the money? It's being paid each month by the vast majority of owners, our debtor problem here is minimal.

To me this is blatant mis-appropriation of funds ................funds which are not for the Communities use anyway !!!

I would appreciate any advice anyone can offer on dealing with this, bearing in mind that there is already an extraordinary meeting set for the 5th September.  Also, any advice on getting the water bills in individual names rather than one collective bill, The lady at the water office was talking about something to do with the town hall, I didn't understand all she said and was too embarrassed to ask her to repeat herself a third time !!!

Any help would be most welcome, thanks !

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Sorry to hear about this "onamission" not the first time its happened and it wont be the last you can guarantee it, One of the other threads has a president that charges the community 120,00 euros a year for security on the community....and they've paid it until know...the brits are not happy and have started asking questions along the lines that you have so well done youve taken the first step.

the second step is a visit to your administrator to ask to see a copy of the communities accounts with both english and spanish translations on the sections so that you can understand where money has been spent.

If you have minimal debtors, then you should also have a budget that was agreed at your agm, take that with you and find out where you are against budget, then ask to see the bank account statements and copies of all invoices over 1000 euros paid in the last 3 months.

You're really opening up a can of worms here, so if you do have some support from other residents perhaps on your community committee or even your presidente if you dont think he's involved? Rally up some support better to be safe in numbers!!!

5th of september egm....who called that and why- whats the reason for the meeting, not sure if you can elect a new president or a treasurer at that meeting or is it more serious and you need to find a new administrator??

we need to know a few more details so that we can fire you off in the right direction asking the awkward questions. the ones above will put the cat amongst the pidgeons, so ask the administrator a few days earlier than you intend to go in, so that they can have no reason not to have everything prepared for you, if they cant then that also asks a lot more questions.

One other thing to get immediately passed at your egm is that no cheque should be allowed to be signed by anyone, if they or their company are the beneficiary. that causes problems between two people in cahoots with each other as they need to bring in a 3rd party to the scam if there is one.

You must also remember that the whole of spain has a history and culture of financial corruption and backhanders, its part of their everyday life so everyone needs to be on top of it to stop it happening again or the first time.

Check out the thread/post "Conflict in the community" from Suzi in la Cala its a similar problem and you may pick up some advice from her.

good luck 


This message was last edited by promedia on 8/11/2008.

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Hi promedia !

Thank you so much for your speedy reply........very much appreciated !

A can of worms just about sums it up, doesn't it !!??

Thanks for the advice about going to the administrator, I didn't know I, as an individual, had the right to do that!

Your question about the 5th Sept. EGM.............This has been called by la Presidenta..........The Agenda is.......Approval of minutes of the last meeting.............Election of a new Secretary-administrator...............Decide about pool closure.........Possible increase of fees or extra payment..............Requests and questions
The previous Secretary has resigned, for reasons I have not yet been able to find out !!!..........but the Admin part is done seperately by a local Asesoria.

I would dearly love you to fire me off in the right direction !!!! I'm happy to be fired off anywhere and am totally up for it !!!!!

I have been very busy !!!!!! Since my first post, I have made and published an "unofficial" community website which is doing pretty well for only being about two weeks old ! I have already drummed up some support and have certain knowledge of quite a few proxy votes.........but I'm gonna need a whole lot more for a majority !!!  A few of us have got together and have arranged a Dis-Satisfied Owners Pre-Meeting Meeting for Monday !!!!! Should be good !!!  I know only too well that everything depends on votes, and, unfortunately, many of our owners are non-resident and I don't have any contact knowledge for them.

I note what you say about the cheque signing at the EGM ................does this have to be notified to the President in writing to be included on the Agenda or can we just bring it up at the meeting?

I badly need to know if Horizontal Laws allow for election of president and vice-president at an EGM( bearing in mind that one of the purposes of this EGM is to elect a new Secretary) ????.........they're not very clear on that point !!??

Also, could I, by writing to the President in advance, get included on the Agenda an item stating that we have No Confidence  in the current President and Vice-President and demand their resignations ????? Is that possible...........I know that's English thinking?!!  I would have very valid reasons that I could state in the letter and I could get it counter-signed by the supporters that I have so far !    Or............is that not necessary and can one just say we want elections for new president and vice-president either at the meeting or by notification in writing in advance??

Thanks again for your help and I'm (cheekily) looking forward to some more !!!!

Cheers
Audrey

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Horizontal Law Section 13.7:

The term of office for all governing bodies of the community shall be of one calendar year unless otherwise provided for by the community statutes. The persons designated may be removed from their posts before the expiration of their term of office by a resolution of the general assembly, convened to hold an extraordinary session.

Hope this helps!

"Thanks for the advice about going to the administrator, I didn't know I, as an individual, had the right to do that!"
Why ever not? YOU are a member of the community, therefore YOU employ the administrator - he works for YOU! Of course, you have every right to go see him about anything to do with the community, and he is obliged to give you whatever information you want (assuming, of course, you've paid your dues!!!)


Best of luck.

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Audrey

At your next meeting i suggest you hold a "what if" debate....what if the president resigns what do we do.......what if we find out he's been corrupt?....what if we have enough votes to oust the presidente shall we do it? etc etc cover all the scenarios and how you are going to play it...TAKE NOTES AND GET AGREEMENTS FROM EVERYONE

At an egm, at the start it is usual for everyone to sign in and declare if they are holding any proxy votes and for whom. This is the key to all your efforts as if you ask the administrator to confirm early on in the meeting as to the owners present and votes they carry you can then make your decision on wether to play your hand or not at this meeting. if the votes are against you you keep quiet and get more proxys for the next AGM, until you control the majority vote anything you propose will be outvoted and you leave with a lot of egg on your faces and the presidente and his supporters come even more prepared next time.

I would suggest that a great starting point would be to get yourself nominated onto the committee either as an interested owner or take on the role of secretary, that way you will get to see the inner workings of the community first hand, you will be working with the administrator and get someone else to propose that you become a signatory at the bank and if things are on a roll, it must be you and one other either the administrator, presidente or vice president. that way you almost become the treasurer for the community signing off all bills for payment and more importantly you are in control.

You need a couple of aims for the meeting...early on, get somone to propose to change the order of the meeting to elect the new officer(s) early on that way you get yourself on the committee, get a second and third person as well if you can to take over regular maintenace walk arounds, you have got the website running, act as communications committee members and offer to keep noticeboards and the website updated with whats going on check out how we do it golfgardensmiraflores.co.uk  we even produce a half yearly newsletter for the community so that all those non residents are aware of whats happpening to their investment. Secondly  get the situation onto the table about the water problem and if you are on the committee offer to investigate the situation, at the end of the day the responsibility lies with the presidente as the administrator thinks they are GOD and only does what the presidente tells them, so he was aware of the situation....he might at this point offer to  resign....you need to have a plan of action if this situation arises. 

Go easy and lighten up on the dissatisfied owners angle i'm sure the presidente will have been warned by someone on the community what is going on and it puts them on guard- change the angle to the residents that want to help make a  better and more beautiful community, then put up a wish list of suggestions that you have been round and spotted  the community need to work on and then take those to the presidente and administrator and get them added officially to the meeting agenda for discussion. When the presidente says there is no money to do these things, then he has given you the perfect opportunity to start asking budget and expenditure questions to try and save money to do these other things....

If you present this professionally and calmly and offer to take responsibility for helping these projects to be achieved, then you get closer to the administrator and understand a little more about the running of a community.

Changing the president is not easy, you need someone that is prepared to stand up and then believe me having seen what our presidente goes through and read justins own EOS blog about his life as a presidente, he's even thrown the towel in after all the crap that has been thrown at him, so sometimes its easier to leave the current presidenet in the stone trowing position and create a team underneath to run the show professionally, he takes all the glory in the end, but so what he also takes all the crap....live with it.

need to go and make the wife a cup of tea now so have a think about any other suggestions or questions and post some more thoughts and well see how this plan is coming together

 

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One of the problems on our community is that no-one is happy with the President, mainly because he appears favours one nationality and put their cases forward more fervantly. (There are people of 8 nationalities on our community.)  However, because no one wants to take over his job as president  -  he keeps getting re-elected.  

Are there any volunteers in the offering for any of the top posts?  

As only a resident is allowed to do this job, it cuts out about one third of the "possibles".  Also what is "crafty" on our community is that the notices of any meetings get sent to the actual address on the community, and not to the owners who may live overseas!  Amazingly the minutes of the meetings go overseas to the owners!!

I have direct internet access to the administrator.  He asked for my e-mail address when I bought a property - so he could obtain details of my bank account to set up a direct debit to pay the community charges.  I correspond with the company, in Spanish if I have a problem.  I started off trying to correspond in English and did not seem to be getting anywhere, but as my Spanish has improved - and I can correspond in this language - I get quick replies.

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abbb1

dont understand why only a resident can be presidente, any owner can do the job - from either home or abroad, our presidente lives in leicester!!!  and if nobody wants the job then it has been known for a community to hold a draw to see who the unlucky person was, they were then elected and notified afterwards!!!

Check out the horizontal laws and the community statutes, we have our notifications sent to the address we specify as our address for correspondence with the administrator. Get this brought up at the AGM and propose that the notices are sent to the requested address of the owner with their request for quarterly communiy charges to save on postage. If its minuted and proposed then the administrator has to act accordingly.

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I wish we had some of you guys on our urb in Peniscola. 
Regards, Poppyseed

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The general concensus on our community is that you have to be on hand (resident) in case of all eventualities, and I would think that it is easier in many cases, to deal with a situation face to face.   Also it's preferred if the president can speak three languages (I'm talking about my community only). Our current one speaks Spanish, German and English.

You are most probably right about the minutes - the problem arises when you don't receive the necessary proxy forms to enable you to pose the questions!!  However, will look into that.

Just one point, if a president is elected by your "draw" method surely he/she won't put much effort into doing the job?

This message was last edited by abbbb1 on 8/13/2008.

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perhaps we got a little confused when you said  "as only a resident is allowed to do this job" really its the same on every community, its preferred that the presidente lives onsite - and i agree it is better, but a good preident in the uk or anywhere else beats a poor one on site anyday!!!

you dont need proxy forms to ask the questions, if its contravercial the votes may count, but if its a sensible request then generally that sort of thing would be passed anyway without the need for a vote.

sure i agree a "draw presidente" will do nothing, but by law a community has to have one so if there are no volunters one is chosen at random and they can do nothing about it. The administrator then generally takes over. but its a sorry state when people who have invested in their property cannot be bothered to protect and hopefully enhance the sales potential of their property.

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Hi abbbb

If the current President, after one year, decides enough's enough & no one else wants "the job" then you have to draw lots & one  unfortunate fortunate owner   loses wins. It may be that they don't want to do it, true, but it is part & parcel of living in a community.  Every community, by law, has to have a President.

I read one post (somewhere) where the owner who lost won had been a debtor (non payment of community fees) for  2 - 3 yrs so he was a great loss asset to that community, for sure.

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I don't know enough about the law to know if this is legal or not - I know that I should for my own benefit.  However, but with my community (if  you are not present at the meeting) you have to have to write all questions  down on a proxy form for one of the residents to put to the chair.  All the questions are known to the president before the meeting.  Have never been able to make meeting in April, but from what I have heard most of the decisions, on the questions are already foregone conclusions!

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Don't think that there is any chance of our president jacking it in after one year - well to be honest he has had the job for five years - and the way things are going he'll be there until he gets his telegram from the ..... well, whoever is the German president at the time!!

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First things first..................

Thank you so very much to Promedia and Roberto for your brilliant factual advice !

Progress report............

Since my last post, hub and I leafleted all the Community letterboxes with a flyer (in English and Spanish) announcing the Owners Meeting that we have organised for Monday (took your advice Promedia and knocked out the dis-satisfied bit on the flyers and on the website!!) and also plugging the website address !

Since the flyers went out, the hits on the website have rocketed !! I'm chuffed to bits to report that posts are piling in to the Forum on the website and, joy of joys, I'm now getting some from Spanish owners ! I was disappointed that I was getting no posts from Spanish neighbours, but I seem to have gone a long way to solving this problem by encouraging everyone to post in English and Spanish and  putting a Google Translate Widget on the Home page !!  (Probably teaching Granny to suck eggs here, but thought it might help others just beginning the uphill battle!   )  Not one single post has anything good to say about the current management of the Community !!!! 

I'm impressing on everyone I can, that this is all about votes, and our collection of proxys is rising ! I've calculated that on a Community of 80 units with 13 debtors, there are a total of 67 valid votes, so the target is 34 !!!!  Still gotta lotta drum-banging to do !!

I've had an email from a non-resident Spanish owner asking me if I will accept her proxy vote ........no prizes for guessing my reply !!!

I've even had an email from a resident Brit who wants to propose me for president !!!!!!!????? Bit previous that, I think !!!

I have emailed the Administrators saying that I wish to excercise my right to inspect the accounts, telling them exactly what I want to inspect ( cos yes Roberto I have paid my dues ).................yayyyyyyyy that should be fun !! It's a Bank Holiday here today so will not get a reply till Monday at the earliest.

Questions for the experts please !!

One of my Spanish Forum posters has put this comment, his English............

I would suggest even to propose a censorship movement,to change the president,the vicepresident and the secretary and administrator.They aren´t doing their work well.

Can you please tell me what this means ? Would that be the equivalent of an English vote of no confidence, or a demand for resignation or what?
Is this something that we can do at the EGM on 5th September ?.......from previous advice, I think so, but need to be certain to tell others at the Monday Meeting !!
If this can be done at the EGM, please will you tell me chapter and verse what the procedure is............as in do I have to inform the President in writing to get it added to the Agenda?.................do we just bring it up verbally at the EGM ?...........or what??
This scenario is, of course, totally dependant on the number of cast-iron votes we know we will have............and plan B is that I will stand for Secretary!


About inspecting the accounts..................I have a basic working knowledge of book-keeping..............which tells me the most important things to study will be the bank statements ( have a horrible feeling we'll possibly have a whopping overdraft!) cos this will give me "the current state of play" quickly, and also the paid invoices/cheques cos this may enlighten me about where our water money has gone !..................any more advice please?

Thanks once again for taking the time to help

Audrey

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"I've even had an email from a resident Brit who wants to propose me for president !!!!!!!????? Bit previous that, I think !!!"

But inevitable! You've done so much already, and shown that you really have the best interests of all at heart - who's not going to want you as president? Do you think you're up for it? It can be, no, correction, it IS a thankless task, and on top of it all, you'll be starting out with sworn enemies just looking for ways to get at you.
Probably better off, at least to begin with, like you said, volunteering for the role of secretary.

I think you have interpreted your Spanish neighbour's post correctly. Again, as you said, it's all dependent on the number of proxy votes collected, but if they're safely in the bag in time for the EGM, I don't think you need to have the matter added to the agenda. You can bring it up at the same time as the Admin / secretary issue, or if necessary, use the ruegas y preguntas - any other business - part. If you have enough support, I don't see how anyone can refuse you. On the other hand, if you warn the existing president of your intentions to replace him beforehand, he may start his own campaign to counter yours. Mind you, I suppose by now he probably is well aware of the website and the negativity about his performance?

With regard to the proxy votes you may get, bear in mind also that there's nothing like a bit of support on your side at the meeting, so try also to canvass as many as possible to your side who can actually attend the meeting - and especially any Spaniards. I needn't really explain why, suffice to say that one fiery Spanish voice is often worth several humble British ones!

I'm no accountant either, but it's not rocket science. Unfortunately, most accountants / administrators do their best to make it appear so, however.
The annual budget should be broken down into various categories, and any expenditure to date should be attributed to it's relevant category. This should make it easier to see if and where the agreed budget is being exceeded. Unless the water bills are much higher than anticipated, the only reason for there not to be sufficient money to pay them, is if expenditure on another category has gone way over budget. Even then, there should be a 5% reserve fund. Of course, non-payment by 13 out of 80 will have a serious effect, especially if some are long overdue. (propose a penalty system to overcome this common problem).
Bank statements alone can be misleading due to cash flow, especially if quotas are paid quarterly, and some large bills, such as insurance, are paid annually. I'd be a little surprised to find an overdraft, because I don't think banks view communities as a particularly safe risk. (Understandable!)

Hope some of this helps.

Best of luck for Monday's preliminary!

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Awwwww thanks Roberto !!

Who would not want me as president !!?? ............the current president, vice-president and their cronies, total numbers of whom I'm somewhat in the dark about !!

And yes........I am up for it !............crazy I know !! I know what I might be letting myself in for because the hub (English) of a good friend was elected president of a nearby community in March. I've heard plenty of stories from them so I'm totally aware of the back-stabbing backlash to expect !!! I don't care ! Somebody's got to shake this lot up !!!!   

What really hacks me off is that 90% of folk just can't be bothered..........and until that attitude changes so the current "elected officials" () will continue to get away with doing what they like and worse without consulting anyone !!!!

I'm sorry, I digress .............

Thank you once again for all the advice you gave me in your last post, particularly about the accounts, all most helpful and useful, not to mention plugging more gaps in my knowledge base !!

Much appreciated,

Audrey

This message was last edited by On a mission ! on 8/16/2008.

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Audrey, when you've sorted yous out please come and sort ours out  too !!!! All power to you and the best of luck, will be following your progress with interest.

Regards

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Bless you Poppyseed

I need all the luck I can get .....................but I'd sooner have proxy votes !!!!

 Audrey

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Oh WOW  Moresado !!!!! 

That is sooooooo clever !! However do you manage to make things like that !!??

I really appreciate the sentiment too, in fact it made my day

 Audrey

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