Running a meeting
The whole sequence for an AGM, SGM or council meeting — create, notice, agenda, RSVPs, registration, quorum, votes, minutes, follow-ups — in the order you'll do it.
Meetings are where a strata corporation makes decisions that bind everyone, which is why the procedure matters. Get the notice period right and most of the rest follows.
ManageStrata walks the whole sequence. Meetings.
The three meeting types
AGM — the annual general meeting. Budget approval, election of council, and anything else requiring the ownership. Notice period is set by your province — in BC the Act requires 2 weeks, but emailed notice is deemed received 4 days after sending, so send it 18 days ahead. More →
SGM — a special general meeting, called when something can't wait for the AGM. A levy, an urgent bylaw amendment, a major contract. Same notice period in BC.
Council meeting — the council itself. No owner notice period, though your bylaws may require owners be permitted to attend.
How the meeting is held
A general meeting may be held by electronic means (BC s.49), and a lot attending that way is present — the Act draws no distinction. So a meeting carries a format rather than a single free-text location:
| Format | What owners are told | Where they register |
|---|---|---|
| In person | The room | At the door |
| By electronic means | The joining link, and any note about it | From their portal, once the meeting is called to order |
| In person and electronic | Both | Either |
The joining link is one you paste in — the corporation runs its own call. ManageStrata never sees who is connected to it, which is why a person confirms who is present rather than the software inferring it from a browser being open.
Set this when you create the meeting, or change it later from the meeting's edit form. Whatever you choose goes into the notice in the words the notice needs — see notice and agenda.
The full sequence
Create the meeting
Meetingsnew meeting. Pick the type, the date, and how it's held — in person, by electronic means, or both. From the date and the type, ManageStrata calculates the last day you can validly send notice, which is often the moment a council discovers they need to push the meeting back a week.
Build the agenda
Add items in the order they'll be taken. For an AGM this usually runs: quorum, minutes of the last AGM, financial statements, budget approval, resolutions, election of council, and other business. More →
Add the resolutions
Anything being voted on is a resolution, and each needs its exact wording and its threshold — majority, 3/4, 80% or unanimous. The wording on the notice is the wording owners vote on; it cannot be edited on the night. More →
Send notice
Send notice emails every owner the notice, agenda and resolutions, and records the date it went out. Send it with room to spare — the minimum is a minimum. More →
Chase the replies
Owners say whether they're coming from their portal, and Meetings shows what that projects against quorum — while there's still a week to do something about it. More →
Register attendance on the day
Open registration is the desk: every lot on one roll, admitted one tap at a time. Quorum is read off it live. No quorum, no valid decisions. More →
Record the votes
Open each resolution for voting. Owners with a login can vote themselves; for anyone else the vote is recorded on their behalf. The tally updates live. More →
Finalize each result
Close voting and finalize from the recorded votes. ManageStrata applies your province's threshold and records carried or defeated. For an 80% or unanimous vote it needs your total eligible votes, and will say so rather than measuring against turnout.
Draft, approve and distribute the minutes
AI drafts from the agenda and the recorded results; a council member reviews and approves; then distribute to owners. Nothing is final until a human approves. More →
Track the follow-ups
Actions arising become directives, so "council to obtain three quotes" doesn't evaporate the moment the meeting ends.
A realistic AGM timeline
| When | What |
|---|---|
| 8–10 weeks before | Set the date. Confirm your fiscal year end and that statements will be ready |
| 6 weeks before | Draft the budget. Budgets → |
| 4 weeks before | Council approves the draft budget and settles the resolutions |
| 3 weeks before | Create the meeting, build the agenda, enter the resolutions |
| 2–3 weeks before | Send notice — before the statutory minimum, not on it |
| 1 week before | Answer owner questions; check the RSVPs against quorum and chase; confirm the chair and minute-taker |
| On the day | Open registration, run the agenda, record votes, finalize results |
| Within a week | Approve and distribute minutes; convert actions into directives |
| Ongoing | Work the directives |
Notice is the most common procedural failure
Short or defective notice is what councils get wrong most often. ManageStrata records exactly when notice went out and to whom. Send early anyway — and note that in BC an emailed notice needs 18 days, not 14.
But a slip in notice does not void the meeting
Under s.47, a failure to give proper notice does not invalidate a vote taken at the meeting, provided the corporation made a reasonable attempt to give notice to everyone entitled to it. An address that bounced, or one owner missed off a list, is not fatal — you do not need to re-run a valid meeting or unwind a valid levy over it.
That is a safety net, not a plan. The send record is what demonstrates the reasonable attempt, which is exactly why it matters.
Who's coming
The week before an AGM, the useful question isn't who is present — it's who intends to be, while ringing round and chasing proxies is still an option.
Owners answer from their portal: I'll be there, I can't make it, or I'm sending a proxy. Meetings shows what those replies project against quorum, and the number moves as replies come in — no reloading while you chase.
The panel reads one of three ways, and the third is deliberately not a milder version of the second:
- On track — the lots expecting to be represented already meet quorum.
- Short — even if every lot that hasn't replied turned up, you'd still be short. This is the one to act on.
- Too early to tell — the silent lots could still carry it either way, so no claim is made. Almost nobody has replied is not the same as almost nobody is coming, and a council told the second when the first is true postpones a meeting that would have been fine.
A lot sending a proxy counts toward quorum exactly as a lot walking in does (s.48), so both are in the expected figure. Owners who said they'd send a proxy but haven't appointed one yet are listed separately — that list is the call sheet.
An RSVP is not attendance
Nobody certifies a reply and none of these numbers reach the quorum count. "14 said they were coming" and "14 were present" are different sentences, and the gap between them is what makes an AGM inquorate at seven o'clock.
The registration desk
Meetingsthe meetingOpen registration is the roll: every lot in the corporation, one line each, with what that line currently reads.
It's a screen of its own because the person keeping the register usually isn't the person chairing. It opens on a phone at a desk, or beside the video window on a second monitor, and any council member or the manager can work it — two volunteers ticking one list is the normal case, and who admitted whom is recorded on each line.
Each lot is admitted as:
- In person or on the call — where they are. Only a hybrid meeting asks; the other two formats have one answer.
- Itself or by proxy — who is standing for it. A proxy is certified against the appointment on file.
Quorum counts who is represented and never reads the channel, because a lot attending electronically is present. The channel is kept so the minutes can say "14 in person, 6 by electronic means, 3 by proxy" instead of one undifferentiated total.
Owners on a call check themselves in. They tap I'm here once the meeting is called to order, and it appears on the roll as a claim waiting to be accepted. A claim counts toward nothing until a registrar admits it — an owner can say they're here; only the corporation can say they're counted.
Departures. Mark a lot as departed when it leaves. It stays on the register — the minutes record when the room changed — and stops counting from that moment, which is what matters when a resolution is put at the end of a long evening.
Quorum on the night
The presenter's quorum slide reads the register live: lots present out of the roll, and how many more are needed. The room can watch the number climb.
The chair can still type a figure of their own, and it wins. They were in the room and the register wasn't — a desk can be behind, and a meeting is not held up while a spreadsheet catches up. Where a chair certifies a count, the minutes state it plainly without the register's breakdown, so the document never disagrees with itself. Where nobody certified and nobody registered, the minutes say a count wasn't taken rather than inferring an inquorate meeting from a number nobody took.
If quorum fails
In BC, quorum is eligible voters holding 1/3 of the votes, present in person or by proxy — 2/3 for corporations with fewer than four lots (s.48).
If quorum fails, the meeting is adjourned to the same day the following week, at the same time and place, and whoever turns up then is the quorum. That last part is what a council actually needs on the day: the reconvened meeting can proceed on any turnout.
Record the adjournment in the minutes; it's part of the story of how the eventual decision was reached.
Owners can force an item onto the agenda
Owners holding 20% of the votes can require the council to put a proposed resolution on the notice of a general meeting (s.46). This is the mechanism owners use when a council won't bring something forward, and a council that doesn't know about it will refuse a valid demand.
Reconsidering a thinly-attended 3/4 vote
Where a resolution requiring a 3/4 vote passes at a meeting with less than 50% of the votes present, owners holding 25% of the votes can demand an SGM to reconsider it — within one week (s.51). A levy carried at a poorly-attended AGM is therefore not settled on the day. See special levies.
Council meetings
Lighter, but worth running in ManageStrata all the same. Agenda, decisions, and minutes owners are entitled to — see tracked duties. Directives make council meetings materially more effective: the recurring failure isn't making decisions, it's forgetting them.
Owners' view
Owners see the meetings they're entitled to at Meetings & votes, one card each: when it is and how to get into it, whether they're coming, notice and agenda beforehand, resolutions to vote on, a proxy to appoint if they can't attend, a check-in while it sits, and the approved minutes afterwards. See the owner portal.
Still stuck? Open Support in the top bar of the app, ask the Assistant, or contact us.