Are cluster mailboxes a common element?

Condos with cluster mailboxes. Understand that the individual mailbox locks/keys are the responsibility of the owner but, what about the parcel lockers that serve a group of buildings? The kind where the carrier puts the package in the locker and leaves a key in the owner's box to retrieve the package.

Parcel locker key doesn't work. Couldn't retrieve my package. Placed a maintenance request with the HOA and they said:

Upon review, it has been determined that service request #XN1151264 does not fall under the responsibility of **** Association, Inc. per the association's governing documents and the service request has been closed.This is not the HOA's responsibility. The owners are to contact the post office for their mailboxes/lockers to be repaired.

The governing documents do not specifically state "mailboxes", which I would consider a community element.

Who pays? The owner who calls the unreachable USPS? Do they collect $ from the other owners to pay for it?

The HOA installed and paid for the mailboxes. Would the owners have to pay if they were destroyed? I tried several times to reach a human at the USPS, but gave up.

Yes, the HOA pays for the mailbox clusters which are part of their reserve study. The keys, if needing to be replaced after a loss or the old owner didn't turn over are the responsibility of the homeowner.

When new cluster boxes are installed the initial keys are given to each owner, after that the homeowner would need to contact their "never answer the phone" USPS.

Your are on the Board, right, Pat? Take look at your reserve study. If the cluster boxes are common area, they should be listed in the study. We have two big sets of cluster mailboxes and they're on our reserve study.

Was on the Board. Retire 2 years ago. They were not on the Reserve study has they have a longer life than the study covered.

How would you handle the lock and key for the parcel locker that services multiple units?

Go to the post office for your zip code and speak to the station superintendent and ask them for a key
replacement to the parcel box. If the post office to your zip code gives you any hash, go to the main
post office and speak to that super or a postal investigator.

The mail boxes were likely part of the common area when the community was built and classified as common property. At a later date, the HOA built parcel boxes. If the parcel box, lock and key are assigned to you for your exclusive use, , it is limited common area and your responsibility.

Lifespan of some boxes is 25 years. Ours are 19 years old and except for faded paint, look great. You are right they should be in our Reserve Study and hopefully future boards will realize that eventually they will need to be replaced.

The repair of the lock will likely be under $200 and fall under general maintenance. An owner can buy a lock for $10 and repair theirs themselves, or hire a handyman, if they have access to the box. The parcel lockers are a little different as the key is locked in the slot after the package is removed. I'm handy but not fooling around with common property should something go wrong. I'm not hiring someone to do it either. Any issues would fall back on me.

The MC telling me that "per the governing documents" the repair isn't HOA is ridiculous. I wasn't on the board for 9 years to learn nothing. Parcel lockers are not exclusive to 1 owner.

I have refiled the maintenance request explaining common property vs. exclusive use to the MC. HOA installed and paid for the boxes. They need to maintain them.

Our Association has a list of Replacement Reserve obligations. Cluster mailboxes are the responsibility of the Board. As for keys to the mailboxes those come from the Post office.