Calm down, breath in, breath out, think of Wayne Rooney...

Now I begin.

My wife crashed the car exiting our underground garage.
The door of said garage was shut. Ah problem!
Right wing like Vettel in Turkey + 1 knackered Garage door.

Freak accident. Laces, shoe...guess the rest.

The Car insurance paid for the Damage to our Car and for the damage to the Garage Door *less* an Excess of ca. 2200 CHF, as the Garage door was ca. 4 years old.

The Immobilien Company who manage our Appartment block sent us a bill for this 2200 CHF. We are Mortgage Holders if that is relevant.

I queried it with the Car Insurance company who said
"You don't have to pay it, the Community pays the Excess"

I told the Car Insurance: go and tell our Immobilien Company please!
They did.

I never heard anything else.

Now, 18 months later at our AGM, "they" (the 66 other neighbours) voted by Majority that we should pay this 2200 CHF as "moral obligation".
The chair of the AGM from the Immobilien company at no point mentioned her conversations with our Car Insurance Company.

I had an angry word with her at the end
"Why didn't you tell them what the Insurance Company said? The way you handled that was a ing disgrace."

I feel we've been punished twice - we paid 1000 CHF Excess for the Car damage and a further 500 CHF on the Annual Premium for the next 3 years (Name of Insurance Company on request)

Now WE have to pay the Excess as well for a New Garage door which was entirely replaced as new? Basically, we've bought a new Garage Door for everyone else. Oh joy!

Are we being unreasonable?
Who is right?
Is our Car Insurance company correct or are they passing the buck to avoid paying the Excess for the new door?

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Side issue:
One of the Appartment Owners is the owner of the Immobilien Company who manage the Appartments.
"Conflict of interest" IMO, but that's another story.

Also, 17500 CHF for a new 2 car wide Garage door. WTF!
I couldn't believe that! It doesn't even look new, it's like they replaced a few plastic panels and battered out the dents.
So I want to ask X Immobilien Company "how much commission did you receive on that?" Dodgy IMO, but I'm not an expert on the Electrically Powered Automatic Garage door market.

You need to read the Articles of your Condominium Owners Association.

oldmanc, I can understand how ticked off you must be with the prang itself. What I am trying to figure out though is why you think your neighbours should bear any of the financial burden of your wife trying to drive through the garage door without opening it. Because that it what it would amount to. If everyone contributes to the community "pot", they would also be subsidising your prang, and I can understand them being more than unwilling to do that.

That's not to say that you shouldn't contest the fact that the management company may have more than just repaired the door.

PS If you are going to murder someone I suggest avoiding murdering the wife.....

Just cos they voted does that mean you are legally obliged to pay?

I'd check the legal side of that.

Shouldn't you have been involved with the discussions with the tenants?
Shouldn't you have been a part of the process of repairing the door.

Check your options!!

WTF do we have insurance for grrrrr

Ask your self this.

Would you like your annual building maintenance to go up because one of your neighbours smashed through a garage door which was not your fault?

Because that is how it is for the other 65 residents.

Not that I completely disagree but, what is the point of the association having insurance for an event for which the tenants pay, if they don't use it and arbitrarily assess blame based on consensus, when there are obviously going to be rules about this. The reason why you pay into the community pot is so that there is money available when these sort of circumstances occur. It definitely isn't to provide another income stream for the management agency or who ever else doesn't want to pay up.

I agree with a previous poster who said that you should make sure that you read and understand the contractual obligations you have and those of the community in general. You need to pay what you are obligated to pay based on what your various contracts say you are responsible for paying.

To the OP, Good Luck finding out what you are actually responsible for paying.

Thanks everyone. I do appreciate all points of view.

Nah, of course I wouldn't be happy paying for someone else's mishap, but we just paid 100 CHF each for an alleged "New Battery" for the electric! Some battery hey?

But at <35 CHF per appartment for the door, I wouldn't have a problem paying that, we just got a brand new door. See what I mean?

Now, what happens if someone breaks a collective door which is 10 years old and the excess is 10000 CHF according to the Insurance Company?
Should the individual involved have to pay all that to subsidise a brand new door for everyone else?

1 year old, 4 years old, 10 years old - what's the difference?

I'll dig up the e-mails from the Insurance company and double-check their wordage.