Board turnover: handing over the compliance file

The records belong to the corporation

The Condominium Act, 1998 requires every condominium corporation to keep adequate records, and section 55(1) of the Act and section 13.1(1) of Ontario Regulation 48/01 list what those records are. Owners, purchasers and mortgagees can ask for them using the mandatory request form. The corporation has 30 days to respond, and once any fee is paid, 7 days to provide core records and 30 days for other records. Financial records generally have to be kept for seven years.

None of that works if the file for a live compliance issue sits in a former director’s personal inbox. Treat the photos, letters, delivery records and owner replies behind every issue as the corporation’s records from the day they are created, stored where the corporation, not one person, controls access.

What the rules require when directors change

• File a Notice of Change. When the board of directors changes, the corporation files a Notice of Change with the Condominium Authority of Ontario (CAO) within 30 days of the change.
• Track the training deadline. Directors must complete the CAO’s mandatory director training within six months of being elected, appointed or re-elected, unless they completed it in the preceding seven years. A director who misses the deadline is disqualified automatically.
• Keep disclosures current. Directors and candidates make required disclosures in writing and must keep them up to date. A director who does not comply is removed from the board.

An incoming board that checks these three things at its first meeting avoids the worst version of turnover: a seat that quietly became vacant months ago, and decisions made while the board was short.

The compliance file handover

Before an outgoing director leaves, the board should have, in one place:

• Every open issue, with its stage, the next deadline, the last letter sent and whether it was delivered.
• The file behind each issue: dated photos, every letter as sent, delivery records, owner replies, and the board decisions that moved it along.
• The enforcement practice the board has minuted: which letter comes first, how long owners get to respond, when an issue escalates. A new board that improvises its own ladder invites the inconsistency our selective enforcement guide warns about.
• Anything before the Tribunal: case numbers, the stage each case is at, upcoming deadlines and what has been filed. The CAT-ready evidence package describes what that file should contain.
• Owner contact and address records the corporation uses to send notices, current as of the handover.
• Access: the shared mailbox, cloud storage and software accounts, held in the corporation’s name and transferred, not closed.

The rule for the way out is simple: nothing gets deleted, and nothing leaves in a personal account. If a record only exists on a departing director’s phone, it goes into the corporation’s file before their last meeting.

Timing it around the AGM

• Before the AGM: directors who may not return bring their open issues up to date, so the file reads without them.
• At the first board meeting after: walk through the open issues together, confirm who owns each one, and minute it.
• Within 30 days: file the Notice of Change.
• Six months out: put each new director’s training deadline on the calendar, and check it a month before.

Keep records so turnover is a non-event

The boards that handle turnover well are not the ones with the best handover meeting. They are the ones where the file never depended on a person: one file per issue, kept in accounts the corporation owns, with a history nobody quietly edits. When the record accumulates that way as the work happens, a new director can read an issue from start to finish on their first evening, and an owner who asks for records gets the same answer whoever is on the board.

For the rules themselves, see the CAO’s corporate records page, its Notice of Change guidance and its director requirements.