Poolside Partners · Geelong, Surf Coast, Bellarine

What we mean by partner

In this industry the word usually describes an arrangement between two businesses: a supplier and a dealer, a builder and a trade, one company passing enquiries to another for a cut. You are not in the room for any of it, and you rarely find out what moved. So here is ours, in one sentence.

You engage and pay every trade yourself, which is what keeps every contract, and every dollar, in your hands.The only money that moves between us is our fee.

What a partner is

YoursYou are the only person paying us, so you are the only person we answer to.

On your side of the tableWe read the quote with you, not for the person who wrote it.

Someone who tells you what is comingIn what order, and what is due, from signed contract to first swim.

One number to ringAnd a written note every Monday: what is done, what is next, what needs a decision from you.

Independent by structureWe sell no pools. We sell no trades. We take no commissions.

What a partner is not

Not a partnershipPoolside Partners is a registered business name, ABN 73 521 325 586. Working with us creates no partnership, no joint venture, and no share of your job.

Not your builderCarrying out, managing and arranging the components of domestic building work is what a registered domestic builder does. We hold no such registration, and we hold no contract with any trade on your job.

Not the trades' partnerNo trade pays us. No supplier pays us. No quote you receive has our fee buried inside it.

Not a referral deskWe are not paid for sending you anywhere, so a name we give you is a recommendation and nothing else.

Not on the hook for the workYour contract with each trade is your protection. Their obligations run to you, directly, and they are worth more that way than any promise from us.

Not the person who signsEvery contract, every deposit, every variation is yours to sign. That is not a limitation on the service. It is the service.

Who holds what

What	Whose it is	Where we sit
The pool contract	You and your pool builder	We read it with you. We do not sign it.
Each trade the contract leaves out	You and that trade	We work out the order and book each trade into its window on your behalf.
The barrier certificate	An independent registered inspector, engaged by you	We never issue it and never imply we do.
Registration and lodgement with council	You	We tell you what is due, and when.
Our fee	You and us	The only money that moves between us.

Nothing runs between Poolside Partners and any trade: no contract, no payment, no commission, in either direction.

Where this holds

Three situations, one method. The definition above does not change across them. What changes is what the law puts on you.

A new pool at a house you already live in

The order is set by your builder's own schedule, and those dates are not published anywhere. They also move. This is where the counting lives: six trades your contract leaves to you, eight visits between them because two trades come twice, and four things council needs from you.

A pool you already have

The council's four-year letter arrives with a date on it, or the interior, the fence or the equipment reaches the end of its life. The work here is decisions, taken in the right order, before money is committed to any of them. Replacing a fence is not a nicer fence; it is a new barrier, built to the current standard.

Doing it yourself

If you are the owner-builder, the regulator's own description of your job is supervising or undertaking the building work, and that is not a duty anyone can take off you. We can be useful before the permit goes in: what the work will actually involve, what has to happen in what order, what consent you need. Once there is a hole in the ground and you want the work carried, what you want is a registered builder, and we will say so.

Everything but the pool.

Just signed for a pool? Talk to us early.

The most useful day to ring is the day you sign, and the second most useful is any day after that.

Tell us about your pool What it costs

Poolside Partners is a registered business name held on ABN 73 521 325 586. Checked on the Australian Business Register, 11 September 2026.