New CSOS developments: What should you know?
11 November | Nicole Nel
During mid-October, I was fortunate to attend the National Association of Managing Agents (“NAMA”) 2022 National Conference, which was held at the Protea Hotel situated in Technopark, Stellenbosch.
Whilst I was there, I made sure to attend the Community Schemes Ombud Service (“CSOS”) panel discussion, on their upcoming transformation strategies. This panel included:
The Chief Ombud, Advocate Boyce Mkhize;
The Manager of Strategic Planning, Monitoring and Evaluation, Kedibone Phetla and
The Gauteng Provincial Ombud, Abraham Masilo.
The purpose of this panel was to discuss a few of the CSOS’ strategies that will be implemented during the next Medium-Term Financial Strategy (“MTFS”) period. The MTFS is a 4-year plan wherein government departments, including the Department of Human Settlements, the department that CSOS derives its jurisdiction from, provide services to meet the needs of local people.
Although many exciting topics were discussed by this panel, for purposes of this article, I will highlight what I found to be the most interesting, starting with the proposed amendment of section 57 of the Community Schemes Ombud Service Act 9 of 2011 (“the CSOS Act”), the right to appeal an Adjudication Order.
The panel admitted that since the inception of the CSOS in 2016, and through the handing down of various Adjudication Orders since this time, that there is a serious shortfall in section 57 of the CSOS Act in the sense that it does not provide for any kind of internal appeal or review process within the CSOS itself. At present, should you be dissatisfied with the outcome of an Adjudication Order, your options are either to accept it and be unhappy, or spend large amounts of money launching a High Court appeal, only if there is an error in law or review for procedural issues, and still be unhappy.
The panel noted that they had already lobbied the first amendment of the CSOS Act to the National Assembly for comment. Once the National Assembly are happy with the proposed draft, such draft will be circulated to all industry stakeholders for comment before being formally passed in Parliament. We note that the industry was previously asked for comments in this regard and we look forward to doing so again.
Another exciting topic discussed was the current CSOS Executive Managing Agent (“EMA”) panel. It was noted that the first round of EMAs appointed to CSOS were focused on Broad-Based Black Economic Empowerment (B-BBEE) requirements, thus empowering the appointment of Previously Disadvantaged Individuals (“PDI”). These newly appointed EMAs were appointed and trained by some of the most well-known managing agencies in our industry, namely Pretor, MidCity and Trafalgar. The CSOS panel stressed that the appointments of these PDIs onto the EMA panel was based on presentation of competency and experience, and not based on colour.
The CSOS panel further announced that it would now be accepting EMA panelists from the rest of the industry, and not only those who fall within the B-BBEE requirements. It was stated that when allocating applications for EMAs received by the CSOS, 20% of these applications will be allocated to PDIs, and the remaining 80% will be allocated to the rest of the EMA panelists not falling within the B-BBEE requirements.
A question was posed by a member of the audience, as to whether or not CSOS will be issuing a directive regulating the behaviour of EMAs i.e. by directing and/or restricting them from doing certain things or acting a certain way. The panel responded by saying that the CSOS are unable to prescribe requirements, or implement a directives and/or restrictions on EMAs because they are mandated to be independent regulators of community schemes, and therefore cannot prescribe the management thereof.
The final topic that was discussed by the panel was the recent launching of the new online CSOS Connect platform, a business automation system for community schemes. With the launching of this online platform, any person will be able to:
·Register a community scheme.
·Pay their CSOS levies.
·Obtain their annual financial statement returns submitted to the CSOS.
·Obtain copies of their sectional plans, rules and any other documentation that the CSOS would have on their file.
The purpose of this new online platform is to enhance usability and service delivery for the industry. The launch of this platform is proposed to take place at the end of November/early December, with the complete platform being up and running by the end of March 2023. We at TVDM Consultants have attended a webinar on this system previously, and are further attending the testing sessions, being held this week, by the CSOS directly.
With all of the above developments taking place at the CSOS, as a stakeholder in our industry, I can’t help but be excited. Let’s hope that these changes signal the start of a more efficient and streamlined system from the CSOS.
We would love to hear your thoughts on the matter, please leave them in the comment section below or contact us at TVDM Consultants on info@tvdmconsultants.com or 061 536 3138.
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