Dubai: A skirmish over unpaid maintenance fees between two Golden Mile owners' association boards and flat owners has left tenants in the lurch after electronic access to private car parks and lobbies were cut off on Sunday.
With no place to park and after being denied entry from the car park entrance to residential towers, dozens of tenants and some owners believed they were locked out.
Novus Community Management, the owners' association manager, told Gulf News yesterday that front entrances to buildings were left open and it was only car park services and lobby entrance from the private parking lots that were deactivated.
Police were called in and issued instructions for access services to be restored. Parties to the dispute were still discussing ways to sort out the impasse over unpaid service fees on Monday.
Police complaints
Some tenants who have paid rents in full at Golden Mile on The Palm re-entered their homes and have since filed police complaints against delinquent owners.
Mohammad Sulaiman, a Jordanian commercial manager who lives with his wife and two children in a seventh-floor apartment in Golden Mile building two, was upset with the deactivation of services.
"The landlord did not pay. They are dealing with us like rubbish," he told Gulf News on Monday. "They left us standing in the middle of the road."
Mustafa Al Naggar was also left in the lurch at Golden Mile building eight and waited for what seemed hours in the late-day heat.
"It was a mess, people were yelling and arguing in the street. In my building there were eight people outside who had issues," said Al Naggar who lives on the second floor with his wife and two children.
Alan Rowlands, general manager of Novus Community Management, said in an interview that his firm was simply acting upon the direction of both association boards to deactivate certain services to common areas.
Separate boards
There are two boards on the Golden Mile, one for buildings one to four and another for buildings seven and eight. Residential towers five and six have apparently not yet been handed over to owners under strata law by developers.
At no time did his firm block any tenants from entering their flats because the front lobby entrance remained open, Rowlands said.
"We understand the law that no one can be prevented access to their own home," he said. "There was nothing stopping them from walking in the front door and to their apartments."
Prior warning claim
Rowlands said association board members "decided to use the option of deactivating access cards for the car park only for owners who have not paid service charges".
He said that "notices were sent to everybody and were posted throughout the buildings".
