BOD not accepting Certified Letters

Why don't you just go to a meeting and ask them direct!y? Does the board have an email you can try? If so, try that and see what happens. Perhaps review a few board meeting minutes, some of your questions may have been answered.

You might also take a look at your letters -if there was name calling,fuss words and or accusing them of incompetence or worse, I can see why they may not want to espond, although they should acknowledge your letter was received. If that's thecase, to to the meeting, apologize for the bad behavior and start over.

Post Office is not handling certified mail at this time

This USPS site seems to indicate that USPS is still handling certified mail:
https://faq.usps.com/s/article/USPS-Coronavirus-Updates-for-Residential-Customers

Also, the OP could personally drop the letter off with the Registered Agent and ask for a signed receipt.

I am not sure anyone will take a certified letter at a P.O. box. It's kind of a general box representing the HOA. So no one board member may be responsible. If you have a PM, they may take care of the P.O. box. I just don't think your sending the certified letter correctly nor necessary.

Will tell you that you can't serve certain legal instruments on a P.O. box. Had someone owe me a bunch of money for not paying me rent. He did not have a mailbox but only a P.O. box. Which means my "warrant" could not be served because the property had to have a mailbox. The warrant has to have an exact description of the property of which it is being served. P.O. boxes don't necessarily meet that criteria.

So considering that, it may be why a certified letter isn't being picked up or recognized at the P.O. box. Like others, you need to attend the meetings not just send letters. Plus realize your issue has to be discussed amongst ALL the attendees at the meeting. So it's not just 1 person's decision but a group at large.

Why bother sending certified letters: are they required by your governing documents?

Just email or send regular mail without a return address on it. That way you will have proof of contacting them (by email) and if for whatever reason you want to use the US mail, they can't avoid mail by refusing to sign.

This seems like overkill though.

Hi AbigailD, until you tell me otherwise, I am going to assume this is a condominium.For a records request, the only addressee that the Florida Condo Act and the Florida Not for Profit Corporation Act require is the Association/corporation. In legal parlance, this translates to the registered agent of the corporation. I would send the letter to the following addressee:

[Name of Condominium]
c/o [name of law firm]
Registered Agent
123 Main Street
Anytown, FL 67890

You may want to start studying 718.111 (12) (b) at http://www.leg.state.fl.us/Statutes/index.cfm?App_mode=Display_Statute&URL=0700-0799/0718/Sections/0718.111.html . To get to this section quickly, go to the latter site and do a keyword search for "official records". I would start the letter with words like, "Pursuant to Florida Statute 718.111, I request the following records... " Be super polite. Let the process work. Fortunately Florida fines if the records are not produced in a certain timeframe and are among the ones a condo member is legally entitled to review.

Pay attention to what, if anything, both the statute and your Condos Bylaws/Declaration allows the condo to charge for records.

Abigail,

Did you send letter(s) to the Board - the directors on the Board?

FS 720.303(5)(a) says, "The failure of an association to provide access to the records within 10 business days after receipt of a written request submitted by certified mail, return receipt requested, creates a rebuttable presumption that the association willfully failed to comply with this subsection."

I'm not a lawyer, but the flat-out refusal to accept a piece of certified mail sent in order to obtain access to the official records might very well be construed to be a "willful failure" to comply with "FS 720.303(5) - INSPECTION AND COPYING OF RECORDS".

As suggested, when the certified mail is returned to you do not open it. That's your proof that you followed the procedure set out by the statute in good faith, and that the HOA is willfully denying your Official Records request.

If they don't give you access to the records within 10 days of the date on your letter you're entitled to $50 a day for up to 10 days. At that point, I think you'd want to file in Small Claims Court for the amount of "damages" (see the statute) you're entitled to. Before you do that, you must submit to the HOA a demand for presuit mediation; See FS 720.211(2)(a). If you send that demand certified mail and they ignore it, then that's considered an impasse (in mediation terms). Then you can go ahead and file in Small Claims Court. When the court sends them a summons via certified mail, you'll automatically win if they refuse to accept delivery of that notice.

Genos: AFAIC your post covering all practical aspects and the 'big picture' of a failure to respond to a Florida Statute 720 HOA records request is way helpful.

It's still way more complicated than it needs to be, IMO. For instance, if it was me, do I want to get an attorney to draft my demand for pre-suit mediation? How would me, myself and I go about choosing from a list of mediators? There's a cost to file and I'd want to make sure I did everything possible to maximize the chances of recovering ALL my costs and expenses. I have to think most HOAs, when served with a demand for pre-suit mediation, would wake up, smell the coffee, and realize when they're about to get into a no-win situation. At that point they should cave and ask for the pre-suit mediation demand to be dropped in exchange for an agreement to immediately accede to the owner's demands and pay the owner's expenses thus far; probably a lot lower in the early stages than they'd be later on.

Of course this would be prediacated on the HOA receiving competent legal advice regarding how likely they are to win or lose in a mediation vs a potential lawsuit. That's not assured, nor is a Board's willingness to listen to reason.

In any case, I think there's more to the OP's story than what we've heard. I think ignoring certified mail is something even the worst HOA/Condo Board in the world wouldn't do.

Abigail,

Have you sent letters to the Board?

Have you attended Board meetings and asked about this?