Browse Forums Renovation + Home Improvement 1 Dec 05, 2022 2:51 pm My house is a cut and has a retaining wall between my house and the neighbours on the high side. The retaining wall was failing badly, it was built from mortar and bush rock joined together. Part of the wall collapsed over the weekend and we had to have emergency work done to take the wall out and we are replacing it with a fully waterproofed block, core filled wall. During excavation which is all on our side of the boundary the machine operator hit and cut the neighbours mains power support which was buried in behind our wall on our side of the property by about 1m and only about 300 below the surface. Ausgrid came out and they cut the power to that line and the neighbours house is no without power. Our builder has said its the owner of the other houses responsibility to fix as the electrical shouldn't have been there and was illegally placed. Ausgrid said the same thing. Our insurance said that it should be claimed from the neighbours insurance as We had some electricians come out to quote for it and its $17,000 to fix. All also said that it should go to the neighbour not us. As a good will gesture I offered to pay the insurance excess for the neighbour because well its really not his fault either. He is refusing to do that and wants to do it privately rather than to do it through insurance. I'm pretty livid that the cable was there, had the retaining wall not failed I would have very likely been digging exactly where that was with my breaker bar or auger and I would absolutely be very very dead right now. For absolute clarity we dug only on our side of the boundary and had no expectation that anything would be there after doing all the correct dial before you dig and checked with others. I know the retaining wall is my responsibility to maintain as we are the ones who live in the cut, had I not maintained it, the neighbours house would very likely be back on mine in the next little while, so I did the right thing. The power line ran with two dog legs through our property and runs at the deepest 1m into our land and runs for about 3m across our land, there is no need for it to be there. Wondering what your thoughts are, are we responsible for the bill here or should it be under our neighbours insurance instead? Re: A little help on who is responsible. 2Dec 05, 2022 3:23 pm sounds sus. Even more so that it wasn't on any plans, it was illegally placed AND the neighbor doesn't want to involve insurance. Id say if they are wanting to do it privately, that the entirety of the run has to be off your property (at the very leaste) at their cost and FAST. "not their fault"? i wonder.... Dark matter scientist, can breathe underwater, mind reader and can freeze matter just by willing it. Trust me, its in my sig. Re: A little help on who is responsible. 3Dec 05, 2022 3:29 pm Noname sounds sus. Even more so that it wasn't on any plans, it was illegally placed AND the neighbor doesn't want to involve insurance. Id say if they are wanting to do it privately, that the entirety of the run has to be off your property (at the very leaste) at their cost and FAST. "not their fault"? i wonder.... Yeah he is trying to claim that its fine it was on our property. Im pretty livid because I would have been putting a fence there on the wall and would have absolutely dug straight through that cable. I feel like this should be a discussion between our builder and the neighbour and insurance, not sure why we are the ones doing all the leg work Re: A little help on who is responsible. 4Dec 05, 2022 3:37 pm Dannymh Noname sounds sus. Even more so that it wasn't on any plans, it was illegally placed AND the neighbor doesn't want to involve insurance. Id say if they are wanting to do it privately, that the entirety of the run has to be off your property (at the very leaste) at their cost and FAST. "not their fault"? i wonder.... Yeah he is trying to claim that its fine it was on our property. Im pretty livid because I would have been putting a fence there on the wall and would have absolutely dug straight through that cable. I feel like this should be a discussion between our builder and the neighbour and insurance, not sure why we are the ones doing all the leg work Why ARE you doing the legwork? Have the electricians move the entirety of the line to his side of the property (unceremoniously of course), Pay for that yourself (probably less than the excess to do so) and carry on sorting out your works. He has a vested interest in restoring power to his property. Then when all is said and done, work out if you want to bill him for the removal of the illegal install on your property. Dark matter scientist, can breathe underwater, mind reader and can freeze matter just by willing it. Trust me, its in my sig. Re: A little help on who is responsible. 5Dec 05, 2022 3:58 pm Noname Dannymh Noname sounds sus. Even more so that it wasn't on any plans, it was illegally placed AND the neighbor doesn't want to involve insurance. Id say if they are wanting to do it privately, that the entirety of the run has to be off your property (at the very leaste) at their cost and FAST. "not their fault"? i wonder.... Yeah he is trying to claim that its fine it was on our property. Im pretty livid because I would have been putting a fence there on the wall and would have absolutely dug straight through that cable. I feel like this should be a discussion between our builder and the neighbour and insurance, not sure why we are the ones doing all the leg work Why ARE you doing the legwork? Have the electricians move the entirety of the line to his side of the property (unceremoniously of course), Pay for that yourself (probably less than the excess to do so) and carry on sorting out your works. He has a vested interest in restoring power to his property. Then when all is said and done, work out if you want to bill him for the removal of the illegal install on your property. SAund advice, I am asking my wife to hand it over to the builder and the neighbour to sort out, its not our problem Re: A little help on who is responsible. 6Dec 05, 2022 4:02 pm just tell neighbour that it is not your responsibility and you will allow their electrician to move the line back to their side of the fence then sit back and relax remember not my circus, not my monkeys Re: A little help on who is responsible. 7Dec 05, 2022 4:12 pm So just had a chat with our insurer again who called us. - responsibility is on the person that laid the cable, but as we will never figure out who that is, the excavator operator or builder need to pay for it through their insurance. So now we risk pissibg off our operators with a job not even half done Re: A little help on who is responsible. 8Dec 05, 2022 4:29 pm Dannymh So just had a chat with our insurer again who called us. - responsibility is on the person that laid the cable, but as we will never figure out who that is, the excavator operator or builder need to pay for it through their insurance. So now we risk pissibg off our operators with a job not even half done Your neighbour is by proxy the one who "laid" the cable. It's not powering your house it's illegally laid and you certainly didn't put it there. He's already offered to do it privately, why would you put this on your guys? The only detail Unresolved is when will this be done. Dark matter scientist, can breathe underwater, mind reader and can freeze matter just by willing it. Trust me, its in my sig. Re: A little help on who is responsible. 9Dec 05, 2022 4:35 pm Dannymh So just had a chat with our insurer again who called us. - responsibility is on the person that laid the cable, but as we will never figure out who that is, the excavator operator or builder need to pay for it through their insurance. So now we risk pissibg off our operators with a job not even half done as the person that laid the cable was employed by the builder/owner of neighbouring property it should be their responsibility stop engaging if a solicitors letter arrives then think about it until then stop thinking about it Re: A little help on who is responsible. 10Dec 05, 2022 4:36 pm Noname Dannymh So just had a chat with our insurer again who called us. - responsibility is on the person that laid the cable, but as we will never figure out who that is, the excavator operator or builder need to pay for it through their insurance. So now we risk pissibg off our operators with a job not even half done Your neighbour is by proxy the one who "laid" the cable. It's not powering your house it's illegally laid and you certainly didn't put it there. He's already offered to do it privately, why would you put this on your guys? The only detail Unresolved is when will this be done. We just spoke with our builder again and he said for us to stop dealing with the other owner, and to tell the owner his details and he will deal with it. Re: A little help on who is responsible. 11Dec 05, 2022 4:36 pm aussieta Dannymh So just had a chat with our insurer again who called us. - responsibility is on the person that laid the cable, but as we will never figure out who that is, the excavator operator or builder need to pay for it through their insurance. So now we risk pissibg off our operators with a job not even half done as the person that laid the cable was employed by the builder/owner of neighbouring property it should be their responsibility stop engaging if a solicitors letter arrives then think about it until then stop thinking about it Yep, just flop the cable over to their side and carry on. F em. Dark matter scientist, can breathe underwater, mind reader and can freeze matter just by willing it. Trust me, its in my sig. Re: A little help on who is responsible. 12Dec 08, 2022 10:51 am Sorry mate, sounds like a fregen nightmare. Re: A little help on who is responsible. 13Dec 08, 2022 11:03 am So they guy has found someone to do the work for $5000 and he is still yelling at my builder and carrying. Of FFS its $5000 mate just get it sorted and move on with your life. I told him to just get the work done, and if he wants to pursue the builder then go for it. He has now gone to council to ask about the work, which council have told him "we will investigate". The wall failed because of his trees, which were two Camphor Laurels and within 3m of my house, i.e. they shouldn't be there as they are listed as noxious weeds in my council. The New wall has been engineered and is being certified by the same engineer, theres really no argument here. At this point I have tried to be nice, but running to council and trying to be difficult over what is effectively nothing and my offer of $1500 isnt enough for him, I just dont get it. So I have withdrawn my offer and instructed him to just pursue my builder for the damages, he isn't a snowflakes chance and he knows it. I have never seen anyone argue like this over such a silly small amount of money. We have had to inform him that we no longer want to talk to him and his wife is not to approach us or our property because her behavior is intimidating, harassing and has made direct threats. So as far as I am concerned it is his problem until I or my builder get whatever letter from whomever. Plot twist is he is selling the house and moving anyway and already exchanged. Apparently settlement is in January. The house was privately sold before going to market in any way that we knew about. He told me he sold it for $2m a profit of $510k on his purchase price back in 2018, yet he is squabbling over this. The only thing that could stop his sale is that there is no safe power to the property. So bizarre 8 6490 i had the my concreters concrete right up to the fence. I have pits all along my path, so the water tends to drain away from the house and into the pits. There's only one… 7 13440 Hi there, I'm a conplete newbie to this, but I'm looking to put a floor down in my 6x9m shed. It's currently sitting on a 100mm thick concrete perimeter (dirt floor… 0 6941 |