2020-21 Performance Report

• 78.70% Repairs Satisfaction (compared to 75.10% last year)
  

Your satisfaction score for our repairs and maintenance service has improved from last year, but we recognise that the service hasn’t, for everyone, been at the standard it should be. This is why we are working on a major review of the complete service, our repairs improvement project which should complete late next year. It is our priority project for the year and our aim is to agree new standards and processes with our contractors so the service can improve where needed and we can deliver on our promises to you.    

One of the things we have already done to help improve the service is to change the booking system. Our mobile staff can now raise jobs directly with our main contractors instead of going through our contact centre. It’s a small change, but it’s made a big difference as repairs are raised quicker, not double-handled and it means our contact centre team have more time to spend on helping customers with other issues.  

We are also speaking with customers about how we procure other key repairs and maintenance services, such as lift contracts, so we can understand what parts of the service you feel are most important and make sure we include those in our new contracts.  

• 1,957 Planned Improvements made (compared to 4,861 last year)
  
• £7.2 million invested in improving your homes (compared to £10.8 million last year)

We fitted over 1,900 windows, doors, heating systems, kitchens and bathrooms this financial year, even with the restrictions of the pandemic. We are now catching up with any improvements that were due to be completed, attending to the most important first.  

The figures for our Eastern region are lower than they are in other regions. This is mainly because our contractor has not been able to complete the full programme this year. Some improvements have been made during the year, but they have not yet been recorded as completed. We are working with our contractor to resolve these issues, but we wanted to explain why there appears to be such a difference in numbers between the regions. Please rest assured, that if you live in our East region, you will not miss out on any improvements you are due and we will inform you as soon as these can be made.

In total, we invested almost £7 million on improvements.

In the next financial year, over 2,000 homes will benefit from energy efficient improvements. If your home is due for an improvement, we will let you know.

• 99% of all homes gas serviced (same as last year).

Your health and safety is always a top priority for us, but the detailed work we have done this year, and the plans we are pulling together for the future, will make sure our homes continue to comply with all new building safety regulations.   

Signing up to the Building a Safer Future Charter shows our commitment to put safety first. We have joined hundreds of other organisations to pledge that all our buildings are safe for people to live and work in.  

Throughout the pandemic, we have continued with important fire safety improvement work. This includes planning major work on two of our blocks in Aldershot, Alexander House and Stafford House, where we will be replacing the cladding on both buildings. These are the only two buildings we have where this work needs to be done.

Gas servicing is another huge part of helping to keep you safe in your homes. We have maintained our high results for gas servicing with over 99% of all homes serviced throughout the pandemic. We always know which of our homes are overdue a safety check and work with our customers to make sure it is carried out as soon as possible.

Our aim in this critical safety area is always to reach 100%.

Residents on our national scrutiny group have also been involved in our health and safety improvements, recommending changes to our fire safety information and how easy it is for you to access them.

• 11,096 MyAccount users (compared to 9,457 last year)
  
• 15,908 Lets Move users (compared to 11,447 last year)

As more customers choose to engage with us online, we will continue to invest in and improve our digital offer to provide the best possible service. Self-service through MyAccount is a great way to access our services. For 24 hours a day, seven days a week you can report repairs online, check the details of your repair, check your rent account and make a payment, report communal repairs, access information on service charges and making service charge payments.

Need help registering for MyAccount? We've added a useful step-by-step video guide below, and some FAQs on our MyAccount page. If you're unable to register and you do need to speak to someone, please get in touch.

REGISTERING FOR MYACCOUNT

• 4.6 out of 5 for our contact centre team

We want to be truly ‘customer centric’ which means understanding exactly what services you want and need, and making sure you have a say in how you receive them. How satisfied you are with our services helps us understand what works well but, more importantly, what needs to improve. We have a number of ways of measuring how satisfied you are with the service we deliver.

We mainly use UKCSI (the UK Customer Service Index) to measure your overall satisfaction. Thank you to everyone who took part in this recent survey. We did have some improved ratings  in ‘how easy you find it is to contact us’ and ‘the helpfulness of our team’ which is great to see. Unfortunately, your satisfaction with our overall services went down by 3.6%, which is disappointing. This shows where we need to do better, and we are working on a number of improvement plans in service areas like repairs.

We also use Rant & Rave , our automated survey, to measure your satisfaction. This did record a higher satisfaction rate this year and we are on track to reach our 4.5 out of 5 target.

In addition we engage with residents locally, carry out individual surveys and consultations and have the ‘Accent 1000’ to seek feedback and use that insight to shape and improve our services to you. Find out more about these under our ‘Have your say’ section.

The government’s new ‘Charter for Social Housing’ sets out new guidance for housing associations on services where they need to improve. Regulation, complaints, building safety, repairs, the overall quality of homes and customer service are at the top of the government’s priorities. We are working on improvements where needed in all these service areas.    

• 2,535 Responses to surveys (compared to 2,800 last year)
  

We launched Your Voice as our new dedicated customer engagement website. Here you can take part in surveys and consultations on a broad range of topics, subscribe to our online community of ‘involved’ customers and keep up to date with improvements to services based on your feedback. It’s also the place where we asked for your help with this our performance report.

Your Voice offers you:

• Quicker responses to comments, ideas and suggestions
• The opportunity to compare experiences with other members across the country
• The opportunity to interact with staff through ‘live’ discussions

This year, we also launched News & Views, as a new way of keeping our more involved customers updated about how what they tell us is improving our services.

Also helping to improve your services were:

• 9 surveys and consultations (compared to 15 last year).
• 2,535 responses to surveys (compared to 2,800 last year).
• ​475 members of the Accent 500 (now known as the Accent 1,000).
• The National Scrutiny Group.

The feedback you give us directly improves your future services, for more details on what has changed as a result visit our 'You Said, We Did' page.

• 570 cases of anti-social behaviour resolved in 76.4 Days (compared to 43.5 days last year)
  

Anti-social behaviour takes many forms. We take all reports very seriously, but we sometimes need to explain that some noise, like children playing, is not classed as anti-social behaviour.

Tackling anti-social behaviour often means we need to collect evidence and sometimes go through the courts, so it can be a long process. On average, we resolved cases in just over 76.4 days (compared to 43.5 days last year), the delay in resolution was due to restrictions of the pandemic.

In total, we resolved 570 cases of anti-social behaviour during the year, compared to 444 last year. Reports of anti-social behaviour rose across the country during the pandemic.

DOMESTIC VIOLENCE

One of the most frightening statistics in the rise of anti-social behaviour was in the reports of domestic violence. We are involved with DAHA (Domestic Abuse Housing Alliance) which involves us working with our customers, staff and contractors to recognise the signs of domestic violence and abuse, get involved to stop it from happening and support anyone who needs our help.

If you are in an abusive situation, or think someone is, please let us know so we can help. Our staff are being trained to support victims and anything we are told will be completely confidential.

FLY TIPPING

Fly-tipping is a real issue on some of our estates, but it can be difficult to stop and to prosecute those responsible. We work in lots of different ways to tackle the problem, such as using CCTV equipment to catch offenders.   

Following complaints on our Ashfields estates in Peterborough, we used CCTV to record fly tipping and asked residents if they could identify anyone. They did and those who were identified received a verbal warning, or had their actions escalated to the council for prosecution through the courts. Working with residents to tackle problems can often make the biggest difference.   

• 48% satisfaction with Estate Services (no comparison available for this figure)
  

Satisfaction with our estate services was disappointing this year at just 48%. Some of this was because we had to pause the service in the first lockdown in March 2020, but we also received poor feedback about the service even when it was being delivered. Throughout the year, we have talked with many more customers to try and improve the quality of services and the frequency of scheme visits, and we are in the process of sharpening up our schedules and sharing them with you so you know exactly what services are covered under the contracts and when they are due to be done.

We launched our new complaints process in 2020. In the first three months, (up to February 2021), 678 complaints were logged. Although that number is high, it does demonstrate the process for raising a complaint is clearer and more accessible which allows us to deal efficiently to all customer dissatisfaction. We got involved quicker and resolution was faster. We measure complaints satisfaction with our automated ‘Rant & Rave’ surveys which showed we are on track to reach our target 4.5 out of 5.

Because of when we launched our new complaints process, in November 2020, these figures are from then, (not the full financial year), and no comparison is available.