Meeting minutes, agendas and resolutions

A meeting leaves a trail: an agenda, motions, votes and minutes. Software earns its fee if someone can find that trail quickly. Picture the day an owner asks "who agreed to that?"

The meeting rules here are New South Wales (NSW), Australia, rules. Yours may differ.

Agendas come first

The NSW Government says the meeting notice "must include a detailed agenda for the meeting"¹. For an annual general meeting (AGM), written notice must reach owners at least 14 days ahead. For other general meetings it's at least 7 days¹.

So a tool needs to link the agenda to the notice that carried it. Ask whether you can see which version was sent, and on what date.

Minutes and who gets them

The secretary "must take minutes at every meeting", and the minutes explain what was discussed, what was voted on, and the result of each vote¹. After the meeting, the secretary must give the minutes to all owners within seven days².

That seven-day clock is a software feature in disguise. Ask if the tool shows a due date for minutes, and whether it records when they were sent and to whom.

Motions, votes and resolutions

A motion is a proposal that owners vote on. A resolution is the decision once the vote passes. The NSW record-keeping page lists "details and results of any votes" among the papers to keep³.

A useful record ties four things together: the motion's wording, the type of vote needed, the count, and the outcome. If the tool lets you save the minutes as one big document with no link to individual motions, finding one decision later means reading the lot.

Check these points on any demo:

• Can you search motions by lot, date or keyword?
• Does it keep the exact wording that was voted on, even if the wording changed at the meeting?
• Can a later decision link back to an earlier one it replaces?

Electronic voting

NSW says any electronic way of voting "must be stated in the meeting notice"². Software that runs votes online should therefore record what the notice said. Ask whether it stores a count per lot. Ask how it handles secret ballots too. NSW says those "only need to be kept for 13 months" and must not include voters' names³.

Finding a decision later

Ask the maker to run a live search for you. Pick a topic from two years back, such as a roof repair or a by-law change. Then see how many clicks it takes to reach the motion, the vote and the minutes that recorded it. That one test says more than a feature list.

Limits of the tool

Software stores what happened. It can't tell you whether a meeting was called properly or a vote passed under your rules. Voting thresholds and notice periods differ by place and by type of resolution. For that, read your state's official strata guidance or ask a strata lawyer.