El Andalous - Maintenance Fees

El Andalous - Paradise?

Each year we have to pay maintenance fees – these cover things like upkeep of the building, the three swimming pools, the gardens, any structural or basic painting work in your flat, electricity for common areas, etc.

Each year we also have to negotiate the fee (this is Egypt!) so that the management company doesn’t suddenly increase the charges. Indeed, we always push for a reduction since our fees are higher than those at most other places. It follows a fairly predictable pattern – as the time to pay approaches, the owners get more and more discontent about what’s not been done over the last year and the managing company becomes more and more unavailable.

Another predictable behavior is that all of a sudden, some of the basic things that we’ve asked for – such as cleaning corridors with water rather than just with a dry cloth – suddenly get done. This year, they decided to put in new lights in the reception area and outside, put new plants in the garden, repaint the corridor walls where they’d got dirty, etc. This activity always stops once people have paid their fees.

There’s always new scandal or rumours or misinformation flying about at this time of year, too. Truth is a very fluid thing over here. Last year, we heard that the company had handed over the management to the brother of the company’s head instead. This year, we heard that actually (allegedly), the management has been handed over to a partner who owns part of the complex with whom the two brothers are warring. Our current understanding is that whoever you give your maintenance to (you can pay directly at El Andalous or you can pay by bank transfer to the managing company), that person gets to keep most of it. It’s not too clear how much of it actually gets spent on maintenance. We ask for accounts, but they are never provided. If they were provided, we doubt they’d be very accurate.

Don’t get me wrong – the very basic items are done – we have functioning pools, a tended garden, electricity in our corridors, workmen on site to assist if we need plumbing or electronic services, etc. However, the staff is largely untrained and they do not understand European standards. 

I complained that the area outside my flat was messy with rubbish on the ground and that the lawn mower had been left outside for a week. Someone immediately came to rake the leaves away underneath my balcony, but left all the rubbish on the ground, and the lawn mower was still left where it was. The next day, I had to walk the manager round to tell him what needed doing. I pointed out every bit of rubbish. This was duly cleaned away, but they still managed to miss a plastic bag by the fountain, which would be obvious to any European eye. But over here, the untrained staff regards our lifestyle as luxurious (which it is) and they don’t understand the detail.

We’ve decided to take a more hard-line approach this year (which is what the Russians wanted to do, but the Brits previously preferred just to be awfully polite). We’ve refused to pay until some of our demands are met and now, miraculously, a meeting with the management company is suddenly possible.

However, despite all this, I think a number of people here are still happy. I passed one of the Russians in the corridor and said hello. I asked if he’d had a good day and he replied that it was paradise here. I agree. It’s a funny kind of paradise (because it’s by no means perfect), but it’s still a paradise of sorts.