Insurables — Australian business risk, sourced and dated

Strata managers: professional indemnity requirements in Australia

Cover for legal liability arising from professional advice or services, written on a claims-made basis.

Data as at

Verified requirements, by state

  • Licence liability condition: Yes, and in the strongest possible terms. Section 22 of the Property and Stock Agents Act 2002 (NSW) provides that "it is a condition of every licence that the holder be insured under a policy of professional indemnity insurance". Every licence, not some. The minimum cover levels and policy terms are set by regulation and an information sheet published by NSW Fair Trading; those figures are not reproduced here because they were not verified against the primary document, and a wrong minimum is worse than no figure. NSW · effective 2003-09-01 NSW Fair Trading · 2026-08-24
  • Licence evidence required: At licence application and at renewal, as a certificate of currency in the licence holder's name or in their employer's name. Because the cover is a condition of the licence rather than a one-off application document, a lapse during the licence period is a compliance problem and not merely an administrative one. NSW · effective 2003-09-01 NSW Fair Trading · 2026-08-24
  • Licensing body: NSW Fair Trading, under the Property and Stock Agents Act 2002 (NSW). The credential is a strata managing agent licence, with qualification and work-experience requirements set out in the Property and Stock Agents (Qualifications) Order 2019. NSW · effective 2003-09-01 NSW Fair Trading · 2026-08-24
  • Licence liability condition: Yes — a minimum of $2 million professional indemnity cover must be maintained. VIC · effective 2026-08-24 Consumer Affairs Victoria · 2026-08-13
  • Licence evidence required: Insurance details and evidence of registration when appointed, and a certificate of currency specifying the management type. Losing the cover carries an automatic consequence: registration is cancelled 30 days after the required coverage lapses. VIC · effective 2026-08-24 Consumer Affairs Victoria · 2026-08-13
  • Licensing body: Consumer Affairs Victoria, which registers owners corporation managers. Note the title: Victoria calls them owners corporation managers, not strata managers, so a search for a "strata manager licence" in Victoria finds nothing. VIC · effective 2026-08-24 Consumer Affairs Victoria · 2026-08-13
  • Licence liability condition: No. Indemnity returns zero across the entire Act. There is a trap here worth naming, because anyone searching this Act casually will fall into it: insurance appears dozens of times, and every one concerns the body corporate's own duty to insure the scheme — the insurance Part, the alternative insurance order machinery, the duty to ensure the building policy is in place, insurable interest, and cost recovery where required insurance is not taken out. None of it imposes any obligation on the manager. The only conduct instrument binding managers is the statutory code of conduct, covering honesty and fairness, undue influence, conflicts of duty or interest, competitive pricing of goods and services, and record-keeping. It contains no insurance requirement. QLD · effective 2026-08-25 Queensland Government · 2026-08-24
  • Licence evidence required: None. There is no regulator holding a file, no renewal cycle and no licence to suspend. QLD · effective 2026-08-25 Queensland Government · 2026-08-24
  • Licensing body: Body corporate managers are neither licensed nor registered in Queensland. The Body Corporate and Community Management Act 1997 defines the role functionally and the manager is engaged by the body corporate under a contract — there is no licence, no register and no approval. That is a sharper contrast with Western Australia than it first appears: WA managers are also unlicensed, but they are still subject to statutory professional indemnity, qualification and criminal record prerequisites. Queensland imposes no equivalent. QLD · effective 2026-08-25 Queensland Government · 2026-08-24
  • Licence liability condition: Yes, with a figure. Regulation 98 of the Strata Titles (General) Regulations 2019 requires a strata manager to obtain and maintain professional indemnity insurance in relation to the performance of functions as a strata manager of not less than $1,000,000 for any one claim. Volunteer strata managers are excluded. Be careful reading the parent Act on this: it mentions insurance dozens of times, but almost all of those concern the strata company's own duty to insure the building and common property, which is a completely different obligation from the manager's. WA · effective 2026-08-25 Western Australia Government · 2026-08-24
  • Licence evidence required: Evidence goes to the client, not to a regulator, because there is no regulator holding a licence file. Regulation 99 requires the strata management contract itself to contain a warranty that the manager holds and will continue to hold cover at the required level, and to require the manager, on the strata company's written request, to provide evidence of the amount of cover, the types of claim covered, and any exclusions. Lapse has no licence to suspend — instead the manager simply is not authorised to perform the functions, so authority evaporates. Enforcement is contractual and through the State Administrative Tribunal. WA · effective 2026-08-25 Western Australia Government · 2026-08-24
  • Licensing body: Strata managers in Western Australia are neither licensed nor registered, but they are far from unregulated — which is an unusual combination. Authority comes from a contract with the strata company plus statutory prerequisites in Part 9 of the Strata Titles Act 1985. Section 144 provides that a person is not authorised to perform functions as a strata manager unless a strata management contract is in force, the regulations' requirements for criminal record checks and educational qualifications are met, and the manager maintains professional indemnity insurance as required by the regulations. Volunteer strata managers are exempt from the insurance limb. WA · effective 2026-08-25 Western Australia Government · 2026-08-24
  • Licence liability condition: Yes, and the sanction is unusual: it attaches to getting paid. Section 78B of the Community Titles Act 1996 provides that a body corporate manager is only entitled to receive remuneration for work performed under a delegation if, among other things, the manager maintained professional indemnity insurance complying with the requirements prescribed by the regulations while performing the work. Failure lets the corporation recover remuneration already paid as a debt. Section 78B(9) adds a transparency duty: on request from any member of the corporation, the manager must make a copy of the professional indemnity policy available for inspection and copying within three business days. SA · effective 2026-08-24 South Australia Government · 2026-08-24
  • Licence evidence required: Cover must be maintained while the delegated work is performed, and the policy itself must be produced for inspection to any member of the corporation who asks, within three business days. SA · effective 2026-08-24 South Australia Government · 2026-08-24
  • Licensing body: South Australia has no dedicated strata or community manager licence. The body corporate manager is a role defined in the Community Titles Act 1996, contracted to a community corporation under a delegation, rather than a state-issued licence category. Whether a separate registration under the Land Agents Act 1994 is also required to act in the role was not established. SA · effective 2026-08-24 South Australia Government · 2026-08-24
  • Licence liability condition: Not applicable to a category that does not exist. For context, the four property agent classes that do exist carry a professional indemnity requirement, and the sanction is severe: the licence of a property agent is to be taken to have been suspended during any period when the property agent does not have the insurance cover required by that Division. So a Tasmanian strata manager who also holds a property agent licence is exposed to automatic suspension through that licence, even though the strata work itself is unlicensed. TAS · effective 2026-08-24 Tasmania Government · 2026-08-25
  • Licence evidence required: Not applicable. No strata manager licence exists in Tasmania. A strata manager who is also a licensed property agent is subject to that licence's cover requirement and its automatic suspension on lapse. TAS · effective 2026-08-24 Tasmania Government · 2026-08-25
  • Licensing body: Strata management is not a licensed category in Tasmania. The Property Agents and Land Transactions Act 2016 creates exactly four licence types: a real estate agent licence, a property manager licence, a general auctioneer licence and a property representative licence. The word strata appears nowhere in the Act, and body corporate appears only in its generic corporate law sense. Property management business is defined narrowly as negotiating the leasing or letting of property, collecting rents for property that is leased or let, and managing property that is leased or let — a landlord and tenant concept, not administration of common property. TAS · effective 2026-08-24 Tasmania Government · 2026-08-25
  • Licence liability condition: Yes — and it is a statutory duty on the role rather than a condition of any licence, which is the ACT's distinctive answer. Section 57 of the Unit Titles (Management) Act 2011 requires a manager to take out and maintain public liability insurance covering death, bodily injury or illness to anyone, and loss of or damage to anyone's property, happening because of any act or omission in the manager's management of the owners corporation. The minimum total amount of liability is prescribed by regulation rather than fixed in the Act. ACT · effective 2026-08-24 Australian Capital Territory Government · 2026-08-24
  • Licence evidence required: The obligation is to hold and maintain the cover for as long as the person manages the owners corporation. Because the duty attaches to the role rather than to a licence, there is no licensing regulator collecting a certificate at application or renewal — the owners corporation is the party with the interest in seeing it. ACT · effective 2026-08-24 Australian Capital Territory Government · 2026-08-24
  • Licensing body: There is no dedicated strata manager licence in the ACT. Owners corporation managers are regulated directly by the Unit Titles (Management) Act 2011. Section 50 lets an owners corporation contract with a person holding a real estate agent licence under the Agents Act 2003, or with someone else who is not managing another owners corporation and whose income as manager will not be their primary source of income. ACT · effective 2026-08-24 Australian Capital Territory Government · 2026-08-24
  • Licence liability condition: Yes, through the real estate agent licence. Section 108B(1) of the Agents Licensing Act 1979 bars an agent from carrying on business unless insured under an approved indemnity insurance policy, and section 22(1)(d) makes that a condition of the grant. Annual contributions to the Agents Licensing Fidelity Guarantee Fund apply as well. Do not confuse this with the insurance obligations in the Unit Title Schemes Act 2009 — those are the body corporate's own cover of the common property, not a condition on the manager's licence. NT · effective 2026-08-25 Northern Territory Government · 2026-08-25
  • Licence evidence required: The Board must be satisfied of the cover at grant. There is no express re-evidencing at renewal, but operating uninsured is a continuing offence and a disciplinary ground for the licence. NT · effective 2026-08-25 Northern Territory Government · 2026-08-25
  • Licensing body: Body corporate managers are licensed in the Territory, but not under that name — the word strata does not appear in the licensing Act at all. Section 5(2)(a) of the Agents Licensing Act 1979 defines a real estate agent to include a corporation manager under the Unit Titles Act 1975 and a body corporate manager under the Unit Title Schemes Act 2009. A body corporate manager therefore needs a real estate agent's licence from the Agents Licensing Board. NT · effective 2026-08-25 Northern Territory Government · 2026-08-25

By state and territory

Licensing is a state matter, so the requirement behind this cover changes at the border. These pages track the licence question in each jurisdiction.

What contracts commonly ask for

Principals and head contractors set their own insurance requirements, and those are frequently higher than a licence condition. The requirement that binds is the higher of the two, and both have to be read from the actual document.

What this cover costs

This site publishes no cost benchmark for this cover. A benchmark needs a real sample of documents, and none is published until the sample is large enough to compute a median honestly. A benchmark from a handful of policies is a guess with a decimal point.

Sources