Emergency Repairs

Urgent repairs fall into two categories: essential services and other urgent repairs.  A suitable repairer must be found within a reasonable time-frame.  There are some times when a tenant may need to arrange for the repairer.

Essential services

Essential services are listed in the Residential Tenancies Regulations 1989 and include repairs to:

• a burst water service, please see Water Corp’s guide regarding leaks
• gas leaks, please see ATCO’s guide to reporting a gas leak
• broken hot water system,
• sewerage leaks or
• dangerous electrical faults, please see Western Power’s guide to reporting incidents and emergencies

Other urgent repairs

Other urgent repairs are not an essential service, but if not fixed might cause damage to the premises, injure a person or cause undue hardship or inconvenience to the tenant/s. For example, a broken window.

The landlord/lessor has 24 hours to do this if the repair is needed to a defined essential service, and 48 hours for any other urgent repair.  The repair does not need to be fixed within this time but the lessor must make an appointment with the repairer to fix the problem. 

What to do if an urgent repair occurs?

During business hours – call your Property Manager

If the urgent maintenance is relating to your electricity, gas or water – turn the applicable utilities off at their mains if it is safe to do so.

In every tenancy, if the need for urgent repair is required other than as a result of a breach of the agreement by the tenant the following must be adhered to:

• The tenant is to notify the owner or the property manager of the need for urgent repairs as soon as practicable.
• The owner is to ensure that the repairs are carried out by a suitable repairer as soon as practicable after that notification.
• If within 24 hours (in the case of repairs for the supply or restoration of essential services or 48 hours in the case of other urgent repairs), the owner or property manager cannot be contacted, or the owner fails to ensure that the repairs are carried out by a suitable repairer, the tenant may then arrange for the repairs to be carried out to the minimum extent necessary to effect those repairs.
• If a tenant arranges for repairs to be carried out, the owner must, as soon as practicable reimburse the tenant for any reasonable expense incurred by the tenant in arranging for those repairs to be done.

At Elders Collie we work closely with local contractors and prefer to where possible use their services to ensure a standard of service and repair is achieved. Please refer to our list of preferred contractors here.

WA Emergency Services

Emergency (Fire, Ambulance, Police) – 000

Police – 13 14 44

Western Power – 13 13 51

ATCO – 13 13 52

Water Corporation – 13 13 85

State Emergency Services (SES) – 13 25 00

If you are broken in to, please report it to the Police and obtain a Police Report number. Pass this on to your Property Manager as soon as possible.