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Meetings, Records & Management Accountability

COA Client Case Records Request / Fee Dispute

When a Board Charges You to Photocopy Your Own Records

An owner's complete statutory records request was mostly approved, but the board refused the AGM video outright and charged a fee for proxies that were already available electronically.

Sourcing: A real Condo Owner Advocate client case, published with the client's identifying details removed and generalized. This is a COA Client Case, not a Community Situation, and was not sourced from social media.

After a fairness question about board-candidate canvassing ahead of an AGM, the owner submitted a full statutory Request for Records: the owners and mortgagees list, lease-notice records, twelve months of board minutes, and a set of election-integrity records, including proxies, vote results, scrutineer records, and how quorum was calculated.

The board approved six of the seven categories requested. It refused the AGM video/recording outright, taking the position that the recording was made only to help write the minutes and was never treated as a corporation record. It also charged a fee for the proxies specifically, itemized as per-page printing plus an hour of labour, even though the proxies were described elsewhere as already electronic and deliverable electronically.

The owner brought the fee to Condo Owner Advocate for review. The core question was practical: which parts of a records response are actually governed by the Condominium Act's narrow rules on redaction and fees, and which parts may simply be an over-charge or an over-refusal without a clearly stated legal basis.

Documents an owner in this situation should gather

  • The completed statutory Request for Records form, exactly as submitted
  • The board's written response, including any redaction explanation and fee breakdown
  • Anything the corporation says about how a fee was calculated (page count, printing rate, labour time)
  • Confirmation of whether the requested records already exist in electronic form

Questions to ask management or the board

  • 1Can the corporation justify each component of this fee separately, especially any printing or labour charge on records that already exist electronically?
  • 2What is the corporation's stated basis for refusing a specific record category outright, and does it cite the actual Condominium Act provision?
  • 3Does questioning a fee in writing put the underlying records request at risk, or can both be kept open at the same time?

Facing something like this?

Read the plain-language guidance for this exact situation, or run your own documents through the Free Notice Decoder.

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Read the full guides

What to Do If Your Condo Board Refuses a Record RequestUnderstanding Your Condo AGM NoticeCondo Board Elections and Proxy Voting
Curated and maintained by Alexander Baraz, Condo Owner Advocate.

This is a COA Client Case: a situation involving an owner who worked directly with Condo Owner Advocate. It is published only after identifying details were removed or generalized, is not a testimonial, review, or endorsement, and is not legal advice.