Lot owner ordered to pay costs from the day a fatal jurisdiction problem was raised (TASCAT, 2026)

What happened

A lot owner in a strata scheme applied to the Recorder of Titles for relief under Part 9 of the Strata Titles Act 1998. The owners of another lot were notified of that application under section 106 of that Act, and they put in submissions dated 18 June 2025. On 24 September 2025 those owners were joined as parties to the appeal that followed, which gave them the full rights and obligations of a party. From that point they had legal representation.

The Tribunal decided the appeal on 2 April 2026. It found it had no jurisdiction, because the original application to the Recorder of Titles was brought out of time under section 123 of the Strata Titles Act 1998 and that time limit could not be extended. It also found the proceedings had no prospect of success. The appeal was, in effect, a nullity.

The jurisdiction problem was not spotted early. A solicitor helped prepare and file the original application but, on the Tribunal's reading, did not have regard to the statutory time limit. The lot owner then had no lawyer for the rest of the process. The Recorder of Titles did not ask for better particulars of the power being relied on and did not notice the mandatory time limit. The joined lot owners did not raise it in their 2025 submissions, when there was no evidence they had a lawyer either. The issue was only put squarely to everyone on 25 February 2026, after experienced counsel was engaged to prepare for the hearing. The Tribunal separately raised whether it could grant the relief sought at all, given a dealing had been registered on the title.

Once those two problems were raised, the Tribunal issued directions asking for responses. The lot owner did not engage further in the appeal and filed nothing. The joined lot owners applied for costs on 10 April 2026. The lot owner's response to that costs application was filed on 6 May 2026, after the 27 April deadline; the Tribunal allowed it in anyway and gave the joined owners a final reply.

What each side wanted

The joined lot owners asked for all of their costs and disbursements of and incidental to the appeal, calculated at 90% of the Supreme Court scale, saying the appeal had no prospect of success from the day it was lodged and that the gap between the parties' positions on the merits was "very real and very great". The lot owner argued it would be unreasonable to order costs against a self-represented party who had no warning of the time limit from the Recorder of Titles or from the other owners, and said the other owners could have raised it much earlier and saved everyone money; in the alternative, the lot owner said costs should run only from 25 February 2026, when the problem was first raised. The joined owners replied that jurisdiction was a matter for the applicant and the Recorder, not for them, that they were not a respondent in the original process, and that they raised the issue as soon as they were advised of it precisely to avoid wasted cost.

What the tribunal decided

The Tribunal ordered that the lot owner pay the joined lot owners' costs and disbursements of and incidental to the appeal from 26 February 2026. It refused to order costs for the earlier period, so the joined owners got part, not all, of what they asked for.

The costs were awarded on a party and party basis, calculated at 90% of the scale of fees in Part 1 of Schedule 1 of the Supreme Court Rules 2000 as at the date the relevant work was done. The costs are to be agreed, or if there is no agreement, taxed (formally assessed) by the Principal Registrar of the Tribunal or their nominee.

Payment is due within 28 days of agreement, or if not agreed, within 28 days of the issue of a certificate of taxation. No dollar figure was set in the decision, because the amount depends on agreement or taxation.

Why the tribunal decided it that way

Costs in this stream of TASCAT start from the opposite position to a court. Under Clause 12, Part 8, Schedule 2 of the Tasmanian Civil and Administrative Tribunal Act 2020, each party pays its own costs unless the Tribunal is satisfied it is fair and reasonable to order one party to pay another's. Clause 12(3) then lists matters the Tribunal may weigh, including whether the case was brought merely to delay or obstruct, whether a party raised frivolous or vexatious issues, the relative merits of each side's claims, whether a party unnecessarily prolonged the case or ran up its costs, whether a party ignored a direction, the nature, complexity and outcome of the proceedings, the parties' capacity to pay, and anything else relevant. The Tribunal worked through each of those in turn.

The Tribunal accepted the appeal had no prospect of success from the day it started, but said that does not automatically mean costs follow. It gave weight to the fact that the lot owner was unrepresented after the original filing and had no signal from the primary decision maker, the Recorder of Titles, that there was any legal obstacle. It also found the jurisdiction point was not obvious or simple: the original application never identified the power it was brought under, the Recorder did not ask for particulars, and sorting it out required looking at the relief sought, the powers under the Strata Titles Act 1998 and Tribunal case law. That complexity was part of why it surfaced so late.

The Tribunal was equally unwilling to blame the joined owners. It found they could have raised the validity of the application in their 2025 submissions, and that once joined on 24 September 2025 with legal representation they could have raised it then, but it would be unfair to label that delay or allowing the case to run on unnecessarily. Its conclusion was that the late discovery was "an unfortunate series of system and party failures" that could not be pinned on one party, so neither a full costs order nor no order at all was right.

What tipped the balance was what happened after the problem was out in the open. Once the jurisdiction issue and the registered dealing were squarely raised, the lot owner was on notice that the appeal faced a serious challenge, and the Tribunal had directed responses. The lot owner filed nothing and simply stopped engaging, when the appeal could have been conceded or withdrawn after taking advice. The costs incurred after that point were, in the Tribunal's view, avoidable, so the order was limited to costs from 26 February 2026 onwards.

What this means if you are in a similar position

If you are in a similar position in a strata dispute, this decision shows two things about how costs are handled in this part of TASCAT. The starting point is that everyone pays their own costs, and the Tribunal will not order costs against you simply because your case turned out to be hopeless. Being self-represented, and getting no warning from the decision maker that there was a legal problem, counted in the lot owner's favour here.

It also shows where that protection stops. Once a serious problem with a case is put on the record, and the Tribunal asks for a response, silence can be expensive. The Tribunal drew a clear line at the date the issue was raised: costs before it were nobody's fault in particular, costs after it were avoidable. The same decision is a reminder that strata legislation contains strict time limits, and that some of them cannot be extended at all, so the question of whether an application is in time can decide the whole matter before anyone reaches the merits.

In practice, most people in a strata dispute start with a written complaint to the body corporate or owners corporation that sets out the problem, what rule or section it engages, and what they want done, keeping an eye on any time limit that applies. If that does not resolve it, the next step is usually a tribunal application.

How to apply: our step-by-step guide to a TASCAT application. More decisions: TASCAT cases and strata and body corporate.

Source: A Gee v Lerunna Body Corporate and D & C Lovett & J Sparrow (No. 2) [2026] TASCAT 61 (read the full decision). This summary was prepared from the published decision for general information. It is not legal advice, and the tribunal’s own reasons are the authoritative record.