After the registration of the land, if an interested party discovers any registration error, although he/she may apply in writing to verify the error and approve the correction, still the correction of such registration error is permitted only in the absence of any dispute over private rights and without undermining the identity of the original registration (Taiwan)

2020 年 8 月 1 日

Luke Hung

The Supreme Administrative Court rendered the 109-Pan-148 Decision of March 19, 2020 (hereinafter, the “Decision”), holding that if an interested party discovers any registration error after the registration of the land, although he/she may apply in writing to verify the error and approve the correction, still the correction of such registration error is permitted only in the absence of any dispute over private rights and without undermining the identity of the original registration.

According to the facts underlying this Decision, Company A, the builder of the community at issue, applied to the Appellee to register the ownership of the building for the first time. With the exception of the statutory parking spaces, stairwell, telecommunications equipment room, Taipower switch room and water tank on basement level one of the community building and the commonly used portion (which is registered as Building No. OO together with the common portions on other floors), the rest of basement level one was registered as a portion of the building divisionally owned by Company A (hereinafter, the “Building at Issue”). Later the management committee of the community at issue filed an application to request the Appellee to amend the registration of the parking spaces and the shared driveway of the Building at Issue and include them in the scope of Building No. OO. After receiving the Appellee’s reply, the management committee was dissatisfied and filed an administrative appeal, which was not accepted in the decision on the administrative appeal. The Appellant and another person not a party to this lawsuit separately applied to the Appellee for correction for the same reasons in accordance with the provision concerning the correction of registration under Article 69 of the Land Law. The Appellee issued a letter (hereinafter, the “Original Disposition”) to communicate that since the application reasons pertained to the same matter which had been petitioned in the past, a decision was rendered not to accept the application in accordance with Article 77, Paragraph 1, Subparagraph 8 of the Administrative Appeal Law. Dissatisfied, the Appellant filed an administrative appeal, which was also not accepted in the decision on the administrative appeal. Therefore, an administrative action was brought to set aside the decision on the administrative appeal and the Original Disposition concerning the rejection of the Appellant’s application. In addition, the Appellant requested that the Appellee should render an administrative disposition that corrects the registration through which the area of the “driveway” within the statutory parking spaces of the Building at Issue is incorporated into Building No. OO. The original decision was subsequently rendered to reject the administrative action. The Appellant appealed.

According to the Decision, Article 69 of the Land Law provides that if a registrar or interested party detects a registration error or omission after the registration is completed, no correction may be made without a written application to the superior authority for verification and approval. In addition, Point 6 of the Supplemental Provisions on Amendment Registration Laws and Regulations, which were prescribed by the Ministry of the Interior ex officio, provides: “If an application to correct a registration results in the inconsistency between the owner, type, scope or object of the right and the document supporting the reasons of the original registration and thus breaches the identity of registration, such application shall not be accepted.” Point 7 provides that the correction of a registration shall not undermine the identity of the original registration. An observation of the above requirements suggests that although an interested person detecting any registration mistake after the land registration is completed may file a written application to verify and correct the mistake in accordance with Article 69 the Land Law, still the correction of such registration mistake should neither involve any private right dispute nor undermine the identity of the registration.

It was further indicated in this Decision that the purposes of the basement levels indicated in the building use license are “retail sale of daily supplies and car parks.” “Basement level one” has an independent door plate. The door plate was not limited to the retail sale of daily supplies and could also cover parking spaces. Since they were not for common use, an independent building number could be assigned when the household agency assigned the door plate. Therefore, the applicant or builder, i.e., Company A, marked all areas in the floor plans in the building use license with a red line pursuant to the Guidelines for Streamlining the Survey Operation for the First Ownership Registration by Counties and Cities of the Taiwan Province, registered the entire basement level one (including the walls) with the exception of statutory parking spaces and other commonly used portions. The scope of this divisionally owned area included not only the space for retail sale of daily supplies but also the car park on basement level one. This was consistent with the main purposes of “retail sale of daily supplies and car parks” as indicated in the building use license and was not in violation with Article 73 of the Land Registration Regulations effective at the time of registration and Article 294, Paragraph 1 and Article 298 of the Regulations for the Implementation of Cadastral Survey. Even if the driveway within the Building at Issue was considered to be a commonly used area, it could still be included in the drawing of the Building at Issue in accordance with Article 69 of the Land Registration Regulations effective at the time of the registration application except for special circumstances. Pursuant to the relevant laws and regulations relating to the first time registration of the Building at Issue, there was no specific provision concerning commonly owned or exclusively owned portions or whether statutory parking spaces include each individual parking space or driveway space. Therefore, regardless of the delineation of the divisionally owned building or statutory parking spaces and scope of the statutory air raid shelter equipment, they were all handled pursuant to the agreement among the parties concerned and their scopes were delineated by the builder or applicant, and the registration agency would re-create the floor plans on such basis and handle the first time registration of the building. Therefore, there was no error in the rejection of the Appellant’s application by the Original Disposition, which was also found to be consistent with the evidence in the court files. Since the original decision clearly stated fact-finding basis and reasons, the original decision did not violate any law or regulation. Therefore, the gist of the appeal was certainly unacceptable.