"Embattled retirement village provider Aveo is fighting another battle over its standard of service and an alleged breach of contract.
Residents at an Aveo retirement village on the Gold Coast are in revolt over the company's decision to stop providing an onsite manager.
The company had come under fire after a joint Four Corners-Fairfax investigation revealed its complicated contracts and exorbitant fees.
Shelagh Williams has been living at Aveo's Southport Gardens facility since 1989.
She said one of the complex's attractions was its provision of an onsite manager to help if there were any accidents, health issues, or maintenance problems.
But in 2014 Aveo called a meeting to discuss permitting the manager to live offsite. Ms Williams' son Greg said residents were outraged.
"It meant first of all that the manager wouldn't be there, secondly if anything happened at the facility there may not be anyone there to assist," he said.
"There's been some incidents down there in the past and more recently in relation to some health issues, and the water was cut off and people didn't know what was going on."
Mr Williams is trained as a barrister and wrote to Aveo stating it had obligations under his mother's contract to provide a resident manager.
He said at that point Aveo stopped the process to remove the onsite manager.
However the issue arose again at the start of 2017 when the manager resigned due to ill health.
Aveo called residents to another meeting.
One attendee told the ABC that Aveo's territorial manager Mark Eagleston told them if they had an offsite manager they could offer a higher salary and therefore attract a higher calibre of applicant.
Mr Williams helped the residents draft another letter of protest, this time to Aveo's chief executive Geoff Grady saying as far as they were concerned the matter of an offsite manager was closed.
The ABC has seen a letter from Aveo to Mr Williams that says there is no reference in Ms Williams' contract "that stipulates and outlines any obligation to have the Resident Manager live on-site at the village".
However, the ABC has seen Mrs Williams' contract and it states: "The Operator shall employ a resident Manager.""
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