Licensing and registration upgrades
Licensing and registering businesses, professionals and community organisations helps protect consumers and the community by ensuring transparency, accountability, and compliance with legal and regulatory standards. It ensures that key information, such as governance structures, financial accountability and statutory obligations, is available and monitored, building trust and confidence in a business or organisation’s operations.
CAV supports the Business Licensing Authority (BLA) to administer its licensing responsibilities and functions, and also directly administers a number of registration schemes.
In May 2025, CAV completed a major digital improvement project, upgrading its online myCAV system to consolidate all licensing and registration schemes under a single entry point. This involved transitioning about 40,000 incorporated associations and 500 co-operatives to the more modern online platform. This makes transacting with government and meeting regulatory requirements much easier and faster for these groups, and leaves them more time to get on with their work. As part of this initiative, public registers were also updated. The Victorian co-operatives public register is now searchable online, improving transparency and allowing stakeholders to access public information easily.
For more information about the scope of the BLA and CAV’s management of public registers, go to the table on page 22 of the CAV Annual Report (PDF, 690KB).
Professional Engineers Registration Scheme
Mandatory registration of professional engineers protects public safety and trust in engineering services, by ensuring only qualified and experienced engineers can practice in Victoria. By mandating registration across the 5 areas of fire safety, civil, structural, electrical and mechanical engineering, the scheme protects consumers from substandard or unauthorised engineering services and aligns professional standards with Australian and international benchmarks. Registered engineers must meet qualification and experience requirements, adhere to a code of conduct, and undergo continuing professional development every 3 years.
In 2024–25, substantial progress was made under the scheme, with the total number of registered engineers increasing to 14,525, a 9% rise compared to 2023–24. Renewals rose significantly as the scheme reached its third year of operation, demonstrating the ongoing compliance of existing professionals as their 3-year renewals began to fall due.
In May 2025, the Victorian Government initiated a statutory review of the Professional Engineers Registration Act 2019, to ensure that future arrangements are informed by industry feedback and the experience of the operation of the scheme to date.
Product safety regulation
Given current cost of living challenges, Victorians are looking for bargains when they shop. Regardless of the price point, people have a right to expect the household items they buy have met the required product safety and information standards. There is no excuse for selling products that do not meet Australia’s product safety laws.
CAV works closely with the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission and other jurisdictions to monitor and enforce national product safety laws under the Australian Consumer Law. This includes ensuring compliance with product bans and safety and information standards, and facilitating recalls when required.
CAV’s website offers clear information on safety standards and a dedicated home safety section. It also provides avenues for reporting unsafe products online and a hotline for urgent complaints about items posing severe risks.
Throughout 2024–25, CAV inspectors took proactive steps to protect the community, inspecting 914 retail stores across Victoria. Their efforts resulted in 16 infringements and 169 official warnings issued, and 49 voluntary undertakings secured to remove unsafe products from sale.
CAV has a longstanding product safety partnership with the Melbourne Royal Show. CAV inspectors examined 380 showbags ahead of the opening of the 2024 show, ensuring 13 unsafe items were removed or modified and families could enjoy safe showbags. In October 2024, CAV joined the Melbourne Royal Show to warn parents and carers about unsafe children’s toys, after CAV inspectors found and seized more than 500 non-compliant products from a stall holder. Items included light-up headbands, wands and fairy wings with accessible button batteries, and banned yo-yo water balls posing a strangulation risk.
In August 2024, CAV issued an urgent public warning about light-up shoe charms and accessories marketed to children, that contained unsecured and unlabelled button batteries. In March 2025, CAV issued an urgent public warning to anyone who had purchased goods from Panda Mart, a large retail outlet in Cranbourne that sells low-cost toys and other items. Inspectors seized thousands of products believed to fail to meet mandatory product safety and labelling standards. These included toys and baby rattles containing button batteries that were also inadequately secured or labelled. Button batteries pose an extreme risk as swallowing them can cause internal burns, severe bleeding or death.
CAV also ran a number of communications campaigns over 2024–25 in partnership with fellow state and territory consumer regulators, to raise community awareness of the product safety risks commonly seen in summer, winter and in the lead-up to Halloween. In addition, we continued to promote the importance of securing loose curtain and blind cords under tension, to prevent them forming loops that pose a serious strangulation risk to children. In 2024–25, CAV sent 4972 free curtain and blind cord safety kits to Victorians.
CAV will be stepping up its compliance posture on product safety breaches in the coming year, taking a zero tolerance approach to risks posed to children. We will actively monitor and enforce the new mandatory rental minimum standard for curtain and blind cord safety, which was made in December 2024 and will come into effect from 1 December 2025.
Renting taskforce
In March 2024, the Victorian Government announced a new renting taskforce would be established within CAV to crack down on rental law offences. The taskforce scaled up its operations throughout 2024–25.
Unfair and illegal renting practices can put enormous amounts of stress on renters. They may experience a constant sense of worry and insecurity about maintaining their homes, particularly if they are struggling with high rental costs or the fear of eviction. Living in substandard conditions impacts quality of life and can cause significant health issues.
The Residential Tenancies Act 1997 establishes private rights and obligations of renters and rental providers to manage these issues, but many renters struggle to enforce their rights on their own. The taskforce has a clear mission to monitor the rental market and ensure compliance.
The taskforce’s priority is to prevent breaches in the first place. It monitors rental advertisements and undertakes education, community engagement and proactive compliance checks. Early intervention and prevention are key to ensuring that renters don’t suffer the distress and upheaval of a substandard rental experience.
Throughout the year, the taskforce prioritised ensuring compliance with rules affecting renters’ safety, security and tenure. These include false advertising, rental bidding, not lodging a bond, and renting out a property that doesn’t meet the mandatory minimum standards.
In 2024–25, the taskforce inspected rental properties across Victoria and proactively engaged with agents and rental providers to help them ensure that rental properties meet minimum standards before they are leased. Multiple targeted inspection campaigns were conducted across Melbourne, in Clayton, Fitzroy, Werribee, Footscray and the Melbourne CBD; and in Geelong, Ballarat, and Bendigo.
The taskforce also initiated an education program to promote compliance with Victoria’s rental laws. This included:
- communications directly to estate agencies across the state, reminding them of laws around rental pricing practices
- targeted communications to agents managing properties that were found not to meet minimum standards; and
- ongoing engagement with the Real Estate Institute of Victoria (REIV).
CAV also ran a widespread Funda-rentals communications campaign, discussed further below.
The taskforce will continue to engage with the industry and rental providers to help them understand and meet their obligations, but it takes a zero tolerance approach if a breach is identified. This means that if an agent or a rental provider is found to have breached a rental law, they can expect to receive a compliance response. A dedicated complaints webform makes it easy for the public to report suspected breaches to the taskforce.
In 2024–25, the taskforce issued 129 official warnings and 89 infringements totalling more than $700,000 in fines, for offences including not advertising a property at a fixed price, not lodging a bond, and leasing a property which did not meet minimum standards.
The taskforce also commenced criminal court actions against five estate agencies that elected to have infringement matters heard in court for rental bidding breaches of not advertising rentals at fixed prices. Using price ranges or phrases such as ‘contact agent’ instead of advertising a fixed price were prohibited as part of the 130 rental reforms introduced in 2021, as they can leave renters unclear about what rental price is being asked, and encourage offers to bid up the rent.
The taskforce has several other matters under investigation and will continue to undertake its important work in the coming year.
For more information about renting taskforce activities, go to the table on page 25 of the CAV Annual Report (PDF, 690KB).
Underquoting taskforce
CAV’s underquoting taskforce combats the serious issue of underquoting in the real estate industry. Underquoting is an unfair and illegal practice where a property is advertised for less than its realistic sale price. This causes buyers to waste time and money on properties outside their budget and can distort the market.
Underquoting remains a major source of frustration for many Victorians and is the top real estate-related issue, outside renting, reported to CAV each year. In August 2024, the government announced the taskforce would be made a permanent enforcement arm of CAV, to ensure action continues to stamp out this practice.
CAV takes a zero tolerance approach to underquoting, which means all instances of suspected non-compliance result in a regulatory response. In 2024–25, the taskforce initiated several legal cases across the Federal and Magistrates’ Courts and VCAT for serious suspected rule breaking. It also continued to issue infringements or official warnings for detected breaches, resulting in 79 official warnings and 48 infringements totalling $564,300 in fines.
The taskforce has continued to undertake its activities to educate the public and the industry about the issue, track market trends, monitor property sales campaigns, inspect estate agencies and attend auctions. The public’s help is vital, with the dedicated underquoting complaints webform used to help identify suspected breaches. It has continued to see a steady stream of reports lodged this year, with all reports reviewed by the taskforce.
While compliance actions remain a priority, the taskforce also improved cooperation with the property industry, working with the REIV, talking to agents at auctions and sharing updates and news about compliance. These actions have improved training for agents and helped convey a consistent message to everyone in the industry. It is clear many estate agents share a strong commitment to eliminating underquoting from their industry. Agent reports consistently account for about a third of all webform reports to CAV about underquoting.
CAV will continue its priority focus on underquoting in the coming year, with a strong commitment to driving this deceptive practice out of the property market.
For more information about underquoting taskforce activities, go to the table on page 26 of the CAV Annual Report (PDF, 690KB).
Trust account auditing
Trust accounts are vital for protecting consumers who make payments, such as rent, deposits or fees, to real estate agents and conveyancers. By law, real estate agents and conveyancers are required to deposit advance client payments into statutory trust accounts, ensuring the funds are securely held and protected. As of 30 June 2025, Victoria’s estate agency businesses operate 6,210 statutory trust accounts, and conveyancing businesses manage 374 such accounts.
Annual audits of these accounts are crucial to prevent the misuse or theft of client funds. Estate agents and conveyancers who manage trust funds during the financial year must submit an annual trust account audit. While most meet their trust account auditing obligations without concern each year, for several years CAV has pursued a zero tolerance stance on non-compliance with these obligations, given their importance as a protection for consumers.
For the 2024–25 financial year, 82 infringements were issued to estate agents and 4 to conveyancers, for audit breaches. We also commenced 7 new disciplinary cases at VCAT for ongoing, deliberate non-compliance. Serious cases are referred to VCAT, where agents and conveyancers risk suspension or even cancellation of their licences, highlighting the importance of safeguarding consumer trust.
Victorian Property Fund
While CAV’s regulatory presence ensures a high level of integrity regarding the management of trust accounts, sometimes estate agents or conveyancers do the wrong thing. The Victorian Property Fund (VPF), administered by CAV, provides compensation to consumers when an estate agent, conveyancer or their respective representative has misused or misappropriated trust money or property in the course of their work.
VPF income comes from licence fees paid by estate agents and conveyancers, fines and penalties imposed under the Estate Agents Act 1980 and the Conveyancers Act 2006, interest paid on trust accounts of licensed estate agents and conveyancers, and investment income.
In 2024–25, 45 compensation claims totalling more than $3.8 million were paid from the VPF.
For more information about VPF claims, go to the table on page 27 of the CAV Annual Report (PDF, 690KB).
Motor car trading
With many Victorians facing cost of living challenges and relying on cars for essential daily activities (such as commuting, caregiving and attending important events), unfair conduct by traders impacts individuals’ financial stability and causes significant distress.
In 2024–25, CAV piloted a programmatic approach to its motor car regulatory functions. We focused on consumer harms arising from motor car traders:
- not honouring consumer guarantees
- making false or misleading representations when selling used cars
- failing to supply goods or services within a reasonable or specified time after accepting payment; and
- engaging in other unlawful or unfair behaviour.
CAV identified the motor car traders of most concern based on an analysis of intelligence from various sources. We undertook targeted compliance intervention activities designed to educate and change the behaviour of those traders, and increase the number of consumers who receive remedies from them when a vehicle fails to meet consumer guarantees to be of an acceptable standard. CAV also worked with traders to encourage the development of better complaint-handling systems and increase their understanding of the benefits of avoiding regulatory intervention through improved business practices.
CAV established productive relationships with our industry co-regulators and stakeholders to support intervention when traders fail to facilitate the transfer of vehicle registration to a purchaser. We also strengthened our partnerships with interstate and national regulators regarding extended warranties and finance lending in the industry. These partnerships provide valuable insights into consumer issues in the broader market and enhance targeting for our compliance activities.
When deemed necessary, we did not hesitate to pursue further enforcement responses. In 2024–25 we issued 23 infringements for motor car trading breaches, up from 3 the previous financial year. We also commenced disciplinary proceedings against a licensed motor car trader for serious alleged conduct. This included failing to deliver cars to customers, pay stamp duty, and return deposits on cancelled contracts. Criminal proceedings are also being undertaken against another party for alleged unlicensed trading.
We significantly increased our frontline help to consumers with car disputes. This saw a 147% increase in advice provided to help resolve issues through our frontline compliance response. The Motor Car Traders’ Guarantee Fund (MCTGF) also plays a crucial role in protecting consumers. It provides compensation to people who have suffered a financial loss after purchasing a car from a licensed Victorian motor car trader who fails to meet certain conditions of the Motor Car Traders Act 1986, such as not repairing a fault covered by statutory warranty, or failing to pay transfer or registration fees or stamp duty to VicRoads. The Motor Car Trader Claims Committee assesses and decides on claims for compensation from the MCTGF. Its functions and operations are supported by CAV.
In 2024–25, the committee awarded 217 claims, totalling $439,905, to compensate consumers for losses incurred due to a trader’s failure to comply with requirements. This included a significant number of claims related to 2 companies that went into external administration. The lead company is now facing disciplinary proceedings.
Enforcement actions
Public warnings
In CAV’s 2023–26 Strategic Plan, we committed to decreasing our response time to cases of serious non-compliance. We have undertaken a range of actions to achieve this, including improving our early intervention with potentially problematic traders, and making changes to speed up our investigations.
Formal public warnings are another important way we can respond more quickly to risks to consumers in the marketplace by getting the word out to protect potential purchasers. Under both the Australian Consumer Law and the Australian Consumer Law and Fair Trading Act 2012, the Director of CAV can issue warnings in the public interest, to expose unfair practices, helping people stay informed and make safer decisions.
For more information about public warnings issued in 2024–25, go to the table on page 29 of the CAV Annual Report (PDF, 690KB).
Court and tribunal proceedings
In 2024–25, we finalised significant enforcement action in 8 criminal prosecutions and a further 7 civil and disciplinary proceedings, addressing serious breaches of consumer and renting laws by individuals and businesses across various industries.
Former estate agent Justin Scavo was sentenced to four months in prison and a 2-year Community Corrections Order for misusing over $180,000 in trust funds. Another estate agent who misused rent and bond money, Xuan Sang Nguyen, was fined and his licence cancelled for 10 years.
Unregistered builder Mark (Najy) Rayes was convicted and fined $16,000 for offences under the Australian Consumer Law and the Domestic Building Contracts Act 1995. Christopher Michael, the director of Australian Property Management Solutions Pty Ltd, was convicted and fined $6,000 for engaging in misleading conduct and accepting payments for services not provided to other small businesses. Zequn Wang was fined $25,000 for unlicensed motor vehicle trading (with the penalty subsequently increased on appeal).
CAV commenced 14 new criminal prosecutions and 6 new civil and disciplinary proceedings in 2024–25.
We initiated proceedings in several cases where businesses and individuals are alleged to have accepted payments from consumers but not supplied the products within a reasonable time or at all, in breach of the Australian Consumer Law.
These include:
- Spencer Porter, director of MyTinyHomeKit Pty Ltd, who is facing criminal charges for accepting $1.3 million in payments from 43 customers but failing to deliver tiny home kits to them.
- Shannakian Fine Jewellery for allegedly accepting more than $40,000 in payment for items such as bracelets, necklaces and rings it failed to deliver to customers within a reasonable time, or at all. CAV also published a public warning notice about this company in May 2025.
CAV also initiated prosecution against Panthera Finance Pty Ltd for allegedly operating a debt collection business while prohibited under Victoria’s consumer laws.
Licensed estate agent Daniela Vella of Harrison Parker Real Estate has been charged with allegedly misusing $230,000 in client trust funds. CAV has also taken disciplinary proceedings at VCAT against several agents.
The underquoting taskforce commenced proceedings in several new matters, including Federal Court action against Ray White Oakleigh for alleged misleading and deceptive conduct; and disciplinary proceedings against Nicholas Scott Real Estate and its director, Nicholas Skapoulas, at VCAT, for alleged repeated breaches involving non-compliant property pricing and failing to respond to statutory notices.
The first 5 criminal cases brought by the renting taskforce were initiated in 2024–25 under the Residential Tenancies Act 1997. A further prosecution was also commenced against Susan Trinh and her company, Impactz Pty Ltd, for alleged rooming house breaches under this Act as well as the Rooming House Operators Act 2016.
Enforcement actions are a critical means that CAV uses to ensure the public is protected, and traders and rental providers are held accountable for unlawful conduct that harms consumers and renters. They will continue to be used where necessary to stamp out poor practices.
Court and tribunal matters finalised in 2024–25
For information on criminal prosecutions and civil proceedings finalised (including disciplinary inquiries), go to tables 11-12 on page 31 of the CAV Annual Report (PDF, 690KB).
Ongoing court matters as at 30 June 2025
For information on criminal prosecutions and civil proceedings finalised (including disciplinary inquiries), go to tables 13-14 on page 32 of the CAV Annual Report (PDF, 690KB).
Compliance, licensing and registration activity
For information on Compliance, licensing and registration activity undertaken, go to table 15 on page 33 of the CAV Annual Report (PDF, 690KB).