Archives: January 23, 2019

apnacomplexnitin
January 23, 2019

Responsibilities of the Resident: A Proactive Approach

Managing the affairs of an apartment complex is not just the responsibility of the Managing Committee. Surprised? Don’t be. Just as the quality of your family life depends on the behaviour of all members of the family, in the same way managing a society depends on the behaviour of all the residents living in that apartment complex. How you interact with the committee and the rest of the residents has an effect on the management of the society. We have listed below a few such interactions which can decide how well your society functions.

 

Breach of bye-laws

In an apartment complex, it is quite common for a resident to lock horns with a member of the managing committee. Most often, resolutions arrive amicably. But when they aren’t, the residents often retaliate by ceasing to pay maintenance dues. Residents should remember that this is a breach of the bye-law and hence, illegal.

 

If, as a resident, you are unsatisfied with the resolution, escalate this issue with the appropriate authority. Alternately, if it is an issue that affects all the other residents then take their opinions into account and put it to vote. Withholding dues you owe the society affects the smooth functioning of the society. You may end up with a shortage of funds. Further, the committee is legally authorised to issue notices against defaulters and to penalise you for the same.

 

Unauthorized constructions

The action of every resident has an effect on all the residing neighbours. This becomes especially evident during renovations and constructions. Whether you change the interior or the exterior of your flat, make sure that your plans don’t break any rules of the society. Get the consent of the Secretary of the Managing Committee before you begin and make sure you don’t become a nuisance by exceeding the noise to respectable hours.

 

Certain changes like altering the fundamental structure of the building and construction in common areas require special legal permission. If you fail to obtain the same, the committee (and even the municipal council) is entitled to take action against the same. Lastly, remember that if not conveyed, other residents are well within their rights to complain against the construction to seek redressal.

 

Favours from the Managing Committee

As longtime neighbours, you might be close friends with certain members of the committee. So sometimes, you may find yourself asking for favours like waiving off the penalty charge for late payment or reducing the rent charged for the clubhouse. Not only is this unfair to rest of the complex, but it also puts your friend in a dilemma. It puts them to choose between friendship and their duty.

 

Participation in society meetings and elections

As a resident, it is both your right and duty to contribute to the functioning of the society. Despite personal commitments, it is important that residents attend society meetings and elections. The decisions and opinions expressed here will have a direct effect on your life in the complex. It is also important that you express your opinions about an idea that is being discussed. There is no point in complaining about a decision taken during the meeting you missed. It is important to work with both the committee members and other residents to make sure that the complex runs efficiently.

 

The role of a resident extends beyond the payment of maintenance dues. These are just a few areas in which the behaviour of the members can decide how efficiently an apartment complex gets managed. We hope you are playing a proactive role in the affairs of your apartment complex – whether you are a part of the Managing Committee or not!

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apnacomplexnitin
January 16, 2019

4 Guidelines For Choosing An Interior Designer

An interior designer works closely with you on the project and sees to it that your vision is given shape in the most effective way. Choosing an interior designer is highly subjective as the project involves personal taste and preferences. Here are a few things to consider before you select the right candidate for the job.

 

  1. Verify Their Credentials

Before you hire an interior designer, verify his or her credentials. Check if they the prerequisite license to work as an interior designer. Ask about the designer’s education, training, work experience and other credentials. A good interior designer will have had comprehensive training that includes flame-spread ratings, space planning, AutoCAD, 3-D modelling, and lighting.

 

  1. Be Clear About What You Want

You need to be sure about what you want before you can start calling prospects. Assess the level of your involvement in the creative process and the amount of guidance you need. Know whether you are open to suggestions from the designer, or if you are firm about what you have come up with. Having a clear picture of your needs will ensure that you hire the right person.

 

  1. Scrutinize Their Portfolio

Studying a designer’s portfolio will give you an idea about his or her style and working methods in similar projects.  If you can arrange for a visit to one of the designer’s completed works, you can get an up-close and personal taste of their finished project.

 

  1. Choose A Designer With Transparent Billing Methods

Understand the fee structure of your prospects in order to know if their billing methods are transparent. Find out if the designer is going to charge you a flat fee or by the hour.  Make sure you let your prospective designer know about your predetermined budget. Having a clear understanding of what you are paying for will ensure that the work is not compromised by any financial disagreement that may come up later.

Interviewing and choosing an interior designer for your project can take anywhere from a couple of weeks to months. Do not hurry, as picking the right designer is critical to the long-term success of your project. Try using the ApnaComplex database to find a verified designer to suit your needs. Selecting the wrong designer, no matter how experienced or qualified he or she may be, can lead to a décor disaster.

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apnacomplexnitin
January 12, 2019

Why Chartered Accountants prefer ApnaComplex

Presently, the number of apartment complexes in India is growing exponentially. With the growing number of apartment sizes, management committees are looking for some active help from chartered accountants or auditing firms to manage their accounting operations. This scenario offers a huge potential to accountants to grow their business.

 

ApnaComplex, a mobile and web-based apartment management service is a one-stop solution for all housing society requirements. The Billing and Accounting module is now being increasingly trusted by chartered accountants (CAs) as their technology partner for offering premium service. In this digital era, CAs who have adopted ApnaComplex achieved multi-fold growth in their business along with reducing their manual work.

 

Top reasons Chartered Accountants prefer ApnaComplex over other software:

 

  1. Best accounting software across India:

ApnaComplex offers online services, integrated with emails, SMS and online payments providing a clear edge over other players.

  1. Helps in saving time and money:

The accounting software helps in easing the accounting effort drastically and automates a lot of accounting process. Even non-accountants can be employed for data-entry.

  1. Supports a growing business:

Not only do the accountants use ApnaComplex for their existing customers but also acquire customers referred by ApnaComplex. As a result, the customer base of accountants grows in size.

  1. Offers convenience to work from anywhere and everywhere:

ApnaComplex accounting software enables accountants to enter and access data digitally. One does not need to carry all data to a centralized location. Moreover, multiple people can work on entering data simultaneously, further speeding up the work.

  1. Provides training and support:

ApnaComplex offers regular training and support on the product and conducts periodic refresher courses. This allows our customers to master using it.

 

The ApnaComplex accounting software is specially designed for a housing society

 

ApnaComplex automates the following housing society requirements for the accountants and management associations:

  • Offers readymade flat-wise sub-ledger
  • Automates unit-wise due generation
  • Provides flat-wise account statement
  • Automates calculation of late payment interest
  • Automates allocation of a collection to invoices
  • Generates reports

 

So, partner with ApnaComplex today to create synergy. Get powered with technology to offer superior accounting services and maximize your revenue.

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apnacomplexnitin
January 9, 2019

Standard Domestic Help Rates: Can it be Achieved?

Domestic help/maids have now become a necessity for almost all households in India. Presently, with the average citizen working in the 9-5 shift or more, basic household chores need to be taken care of. It becomes essential that you hire the right person for all these activities that affect your day-to-day lives.

 

Some of the cities such as Delhi, Bangalore, Mumbai and Hyderabad have several high-rise apartments with 700+ people residing in the same. The amount of domestic help available in such apartments should also be abundant? But this is not the case and the simple rule of economics that demand generates supply fails here. Finding domestic help is not easy irrespective of where you stay or how much you can pay. Sooner or later you do go through the pain of finding the right domestic help and retaining the same. Essentially, the story remains the same whether you reside in a big apartment or small: demands by the domestic staff for salary hikes are too frequent and largely unaffordable.

How can you tackle this problem?

 

Tips to standardise domestic help rates:

  • Prepare a rate card for all the household activities and ask residents to pay only that much.
  • Every maid needs to carry a No-objection-certificate from her previous employer so that the prospective employer ensures she/he is not switching jobs for money.
  • Residents are requested not to deviate from the rate card.
  • Any domestic help asking for more than the agreed rates are penalized.

 

Pitfalls of standardised rates:

The question that arises from the above pointers is that how easy is it to apply these rules to housing societies. A lot of residents were happy with the above-mentioned resolutions, however, some disagreed to the resolutions claiming that they were quite capitalist in nature and if doctors/engineers can demand their price, why can’t the domestic help do the same? The whole demand and supply economics lies in the scenario that if you can afford a maid for Rs. 8,000 and can very well afford it, it doesn’t matter to you if others in the apartment are paying Rs. 3,000. The others sooner or later will have to succumb to the so-called “market rate” pressure and increase the salary bars.

 

The resolutions mentioned above can only work if people living in an apartment work as a team with their associations and come to a common resolution wherein neither the domestic help is exploited nor are the employers blackmailed for sudden pay hikes.

 

Until then people with maids/drivers working with you for more than a year, good luck in maintaining them. For people searching for a good domestic help, best of luck for your quest to find the right domestic help!

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apnacomplexnitin
January 4, 2019

Ensure Vehicle Safety with Vehicle Sentry

Vehicle Tracking of is one of the key responsibilities for security guards of every apartment. In addition, Vehicle Security itself is a very important issue for every society. With theft of vehicles increasing, it has become an imperative for societies to address this issue. How would one know whether their vehicle is safe and is still at the same place they left it? Wouldn’t it be nice to be able to keep track of your vehicle’s movement whenever you are not using it?

 

The system in most housing societies:

“Parking lot stickers” are issued to vehicle owners. These are stuck to windshields. Vehicles are permitted entry into a complex after the sticker is verified by the security guard. However, since there is no way to “deactivate” the sticker the entry of unauthorized vehicles even after they left the society cannot be controlled. Further, there is no record or log of the entry or exit of vehicles of the residents. In case of a security issue, this can be a major shortcoming.

 

Our solution:

Vehicle Sentry is a Vehicle Tracking System that is RFID based and fully integrated with the ApnaComplex cloud. At a broad level, Vehicle Sentry includes RFID tags for all authorized vehicles and RFID readers at the gate. This allows you to track the movement of your vehicle when it exits or enters the apartment gate.

 

How does Vehicle Sentry work?

Authorized vehicles are first fitted with RFID tags. Next, RFID readers are installed at the gates. These Readers come with ApnaComplex’s own custom hardware called ‘Sentry Controller’ that acts as the gateway between ApnaComplex Cloud and the RFID Readers. Sentry Controller helps sync the vehicle entry, and exit information to the ApnaComplex cloud server in near real-time, and also keeps the reader in sync with tags issued for new vehicles and de-activated tag list.

 

Important features of Vehicle Sentry:

  • When a Vehicle with valid tag passes near the gate, the light/buzzer connected to the reader will buzz indicating the detection.
  • It can also be configured to hoot for invalid tags.
  • It can be hooked up with a boom barrier for automatic entry/exit.
  • Vehicle movement information will get automatically synced up with the ApnaComplex portal.
  • Admins can check the vehicle movement records any time in the portal.
  • Data of any new tags issues or old tags deactivated will automatically update the RFID reader (as long as it has internet connectivity)

 

Benefits of Vehicle Sentry:

  1. Increased security in your society:

The movement of every vehicle entering and leaving the campus can be tracked, making it more secure. Unwanted intrusion is avoided with the use of Vehicle Sentry.

 

  1. Easy and quick Updates:

All the data for your entire apartment complex is stored in a single database. Any other RFID solution you implement will force you to maintain separate databases for vehicles and apartment units. This means you need to manually update the same information over and over again. Vehicle Sentry is an integrated solution and redundant efforts do not come into the picture.

 

  1. Cost Effective:

No extra hardware is needed apart from RFID reader installed at the gate. All functionalities are driven from the ApnaComplex portal. Your estate manager can issue and deactivate tags to be updated to the portal. In addition, you could just deploy the vehicle movement tracking with our boom barrier, making it very cost effective for the housing society.

 

This is yet another innovative approach by ApnaComplex to keep your mind free from worry while providing you with the best services possible. To know more about Vehicle Sentry and to implement it in your society, kindly submit a sales request at the Contact Us page and we will get back to you with the details.

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