How we are providing our services to you
Repairs
We know repairs are one of the most important services we provide. We continue to complete all emergency repairs within 24 hours which we are pleased to say has been on target for 12 months. When it comes to routine repairs, our target this year is to complete 90% within 28 days. We are currently completing 71% of them in that timeframe.
We have a plan in place to deliver the improvements we know are needed and will provide monthly updates on our website until we’ve got timescales for completing repairs where we want them to be.
This plan is having an impact, particularly around the number of repairs jobs we are working on across all locations. The fewer jobs we have open on our systems, the quicker we will be able to book in new routine repairs and complete them.
Colleagues brought the number of open jobs down from around 3300 at the end of June to around 2600 by the end of November. We have managed to reduce the number of jobs open further during December 2023 and we are on track to achieve our target for the end of December, to have less than 2,450 open jobs. This is despite receiving a higher than usual number of new repairs jobs between September and November.
We are aiming to hit our 90% of routine repairs in target by June 2024. We expect to see steady improvements towards the target from December 2024.
Please continue to contact us when you need a repair to your home. We’re pleased to let you know that we’ve improved our report a repair feature on our website and you can now pick your own appointment date and time when reporting a repair.
If you live in a block of flats or a complex, we’re responsible for all communal areas and facilities. You can report a communal repair in the account section.
Condensation, Damp and Mould
If ever you have any concerns about any kind of mould in a settle property, and you don’t feel we are already working with you to resolve this, please let us know. You can complete an online form to provide more details or contact us directly.
If you are experiencing condensation, damp or mould in the communal area of your property, you can complete a damp and mould report form in the Report a problem in a communal area or contact us directly.
We’ve produced a short video with our Executive Directors Jesse and Dean which includes ways to reduce condensation in your home that can be created by everyday activities like cooking and washing, along with tips on keeping your home ventilated and warm.
Contact Hub
On average we’ve answered 83% of the calls that came into the customer services hub this year and are working towards a target of 85% or more. By early November we had also successfully reduced the number of days it was taking us to respond to residents who contact us through our website to five working days.
We are making better use of technology to improve the services we offer. Residents can now request a call back rather than wait on a call and our phone system will recognise a resident’s account from their phone number which is automatically brought up on screen.
If you’d prefer not to wait in a call queue, you can report repairs, make complaints, check your rent balance and make a payment through your online account. Just click on the blue ‘my account’ button on our website.
Gardening and neighbourhood maintenance
We know how important it is to ensure we keep communal areas and grounds well maintained. As part of this we are in the process of agreeing a new cleaning contract to drive improvement and working on a neighbourhood maintenance improvement plan. We are also pleased to let to know that if you live in a block of flats, you can now track all repairs and cleaning for your block on our website.
We also carry out regular action days in neighbourhoods where dissatisfaction around the quality of the neighbourhood and communal spaces has been higher in the Tenant Satisfaction Measures. The target for dissatisfaction is less than 20%. We are going out to these neighbourhoods to understand how residents feel and what we can do to make improvements. Neighbourhoods we have visited over the last number of months include – Mendip Way in Stevenage; Pyms Close and the Jackmans in Letchworth Garden City; Knebworth; and the villages of Little Wymondly, Weston, Gravely and Kimpton near Hitchin.
We get in touch with residents in these areas before we come out to let them know so they can come along and take part if they so wish. We’ll keep our website updated with details of future neighbourhood action events and contact residents living in those areas directly with details of activities we are planning.
