General information, not legal or surveying advice. In Queensland, Business Queensland’s page on survey marks and property boundaries is the official place to check; in Victoria, the Surveyors Registration Board of Victoria. Both are listed at the foot of this page.
What does not mark the boundary
Business Queensland is plain about it: a survey plan does not show where the kerb sits in relation to the boundaries, so measuring from the kerb will not find a property boundary. The Queensland Globe, the state’s online map, shows parcel lines too, but the government says those lines do not represent the true boundaries on the ground and should not be relied on for them.
Consumer Affairs Victoria’s due diligence checklist for buyers makes the same point from the other side. It suggests comparing the measurements on the title with the fences and buildings actually standing on the land, and, if they do not seem to match, speaking to a lawyer or conveyancer or commissioning a site survey to establish the boundaries.
What is in the ground
Queensland’s page describes the marks a buyer may find on or near a block.
- Cadastral mark
- Marks a property boundary, most often as a white peg at a corner.
- Reference mark
- Placed near a corner peg to help a surveyor re-establish the corner later: usually an iron pin buried close by, or a nail in the kerb.
- Permanent survey mark
- A more substantial mark, such as a concrete block buried 300 millimetres deep with a brass plaque at its centre, or a mini mark set in the kerb. These usually carry a number and are recorded in the state’s Survey Control Database.
These marks are protected. Queensland makes it an offence, under section 42 of its Survey and Mapping Infrastructure Act 2003, to disturb a survey mark unless that has been approved. Cadastral marks, the state says, should be disturbed only where building a fence or structure along a boundary requires it, or by a registered surveyor doing a survey. Survey control reports for permanent marks, with a sketch of each mark, are free through the Queensland Globe.
Who may mark a boundary
| Point | Queensland | Victoria |
|---|---|---|
| The professional | A surveyor registered with the Surveyors Board of Queensland. | A licensed surveyor, registered by the Surveyors Registration Board of Victoria under the Surveying Act 2004. |
| The kinds of survey | Cadastral surveys, which include subdivision surveys (creating or changing boundaries) and identification surveys (marking existing ones). | Cadastral surveys, done mostly to subdivide land or to re-establish the boundaries of land surveyed before. |
| A survey by anyone else | Only registered surveyors can undertake cadastral surveys. | Anyone else who does a boundary survey can be prosecuted, and the survey has no legal standing. |
The Victorian board lists people who are not licensed surveyors, whatever their skill. Among them are architects, building surveyors and building inspectors, builders and fencing contractors, property developers and engineers, landscape gardeners, and people who produce plans or maps. A fencing contractor builds the fence; under the board’s rule, only a licensed surveyor defines where the boundary runs.
When the Victorian board says a licensed surveyor is needed
The board’s own list of occasions:
- to find out where a property’s boundaries are
- to build on or near a boundary
- to claim title to land by adverse possession
- to subdivide a property, or to create an easement over it
- to set up a building strata development.
Checking the register
The Surveyors Registration Board of Victoria keeps a Register of Licensed Surveyors under section 15 of the Surveying Act 2004. Anyone may inspect it at the board’s office during ordinary hours without charge, and an abridged copy is online, showing at least each surveyor’s name, registration number and status. The status is the part to read:
| Status | What it means for a boundary survey |
|---|---|
| Practising | Authorised to carry out cadastral surveys. |
| Non-practising | Not authorised to carry out cadastral surveys. |
| Suspended | Registration suspended after disciplinary action. |
| Expired | Registration lapsed on 31 December. A practising surveyor shown as expired may still carry out cadastral surveys until 31 March while renewing. |
The board describes the online copy as abridged and liable to change at short notice, and suggests contacting its secretariat to confirm a surveyor’s current status.
When a survey turns something up
Queensland’s page sets out what happens around a boundary survey, and most of it concerns the neighbours as much as the owner.
- Access. A surveyor may enter land to survey it or to place marks, under section 22 of the Survey and Mapping Infrastructure Act 2003, subject to the notice of entry in section 23. Usually the surveyor asks the occupier first. The power does not extend to entering a building where someone lives, and obstructing a surveyor without a reasonable excuse is an offence under section 27(2)(a).
- Notice to neighbours. When a surveyor reinstates a boundary, every landholder who may be affected must be told. That notification is a record for their information, not a demand that anyone remove an encroachment.
- Disagreement. An owner who disagrees with where a corner mark has been placed is told to raise it with the surveyor first. Where an error or negligence is suspected, the page points to “independent legal advice”, and says adjoining owners may engage “an independent registered cadastral surveyor” to identify the boundary.
- Disputes. Disputes between neighbours over a boundary are for dispute resolution, mediation or other remedies, and the page names the Queensland Civil and Administrative Tribunal for information on boundary disputes.
- Retaining walls. A cadastral surveyor can fix where a retaining wall sits against the boundary, but the page notes that who built the wall and who benefits from it also matter.
Whether a fence stands on the common boundary is itself a question for an identification survey by a registered cadastral surveyor, Business Queensland says. What happens to that fence next is Peg C, dividing fences; the rights other people may hold over the land inside the boundary are Peg B, easements and access.