How we’re providing our services to you – May 2024
Below is an update on the services we provide, and where we are making improvements following resident feedback. We use feedback from areas including the Tenant Satisfaction Measures surveys, our Big Door Knock, Voice of the Resident Panel and complaints.
The Tenant Satisfaction Measures are part of the ways the Regulator of Social Housing assesses how well social housing landlords in England like settle are doing at providing good quality homes and services.
We have recently published our latest results against the full Tenant Satisfaction Measures on our website, using data collected from almost 1400 residents between April 2023 and the end of March 2024. By June this year, along with other landlords, we are required to submit the data gathered from Tenant Satisfaction Measure surveys during this time to the Regulator.
Earlier this year, our research partner, Acuity Research and Practice also surveyed some of settle’s shared owners for the 2023/24 year and we have posted these results our website – Tenant Satisfaction Measures- Shared Owners. We do not have to report this data collected to the Regulator as we currently have 664 homes with shared owner residents, and we are only required to report on over 1,000 homes.
Routine repairs
Our target is to complete 90% of routine repairs within 28 days. This target is set for the year which runs from 1st April to 31st March. We ended the year that finished on 31st March 2024 having completed 72% of repairs within target, reducing the average days to complete from 29 days in 2022-23 to 26 days in 2023-24.
We know that providing good quality, timely repairs is one of the most important services we provide, and that there is more we need to do. The Tenant Satisfaction Measures surveys show that resident most frequently referred to the repairs service, particularly the timescales to complete repairs and outstanding repairs, as an area in need of more improvement.
22% were dissatisfied with the overall repairs service, while 30% of residents surveyed said they were dissatisfied with the time taken to complete a recent repair after they reported it.
We have a repairs improvement plan in place and will continue our focus on delivering this. We are providing monthly updates on our website about the progress we are making.
As part of this, we expect to increase the volume of repairs we complete within the 28-day target to 78% by September 2024.
Residents have also told us that it’s frustrating when we don’t get things right first time. We’re also improving our processes to help us assess and diagnose problems more accurately, and the improved process will help us better prepare for your repair. We continue to complete 100% of emergency repairs within 24 hours and will continue doing all we can to book in routine repairs as quickly as possible.
Condensation, damp and mould
We take any reports of damp and mould very seriously and remain committed to supporting residents to raise any requests for support with this to us. If you have any concerns about any kind of mould in your home and you don’t feel we are already working with you to resolve this, please let us know. You can complete a damp and mould report form in the Condensation, Damp and Mould section to provide more details or contact us directly.
If you are experiencing condensation, damp or mould in the communal area of your property, please let us know as soon as possible. You can complete a damp and mould report form in the Report a problem in a communal area or contact us directly.
Contact Hub
The target for the Hub is to answer 85% of calls. We achieved 84% for the year to the end of April 2024, and 85% in March. The Tenant Satisfaction Measures also show the importance of communication, across all of our work.
15% of residents were dissatisfied with how well we keep them informed about things that matter. Almost 70% were satisfied, but we know that we need to improve how we are keeping residents updated on things like repairs and to always be clear on any next steps we are taking so residents understand what’s happening.
Listening to resident feedback, we continue to improve our services. Some of the things that we have introduced since November 2023 include:
- Ring back service – where residents can now request a call back rather than waiting in a queue. Our phone system will recognise a resident’s account from their phone number which is automatically brought up on screen.
- Reduced the number of days it was taking us to respond to residents who contacted us through our website to five working days.
- Relaunched Live Chat – you can access this now on the bottom right-hand corner of our web page. We’re working to roll this out through online accounts and other pages across the website.
In addition, we have recently begun trialling video calling. Our colleagues in the Hub will offer a video call to help with diagnosing a repair. We have completed over 40 successful video calls since the launch.
Remember, 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 residents that we keep communal areas clean, and grounds well maintained.
Through the Tenant Satisfaction Measures surveys, 27% of residents told us they were dissatisfied with how well we keep communal areas clean and well maintained.
We have a neighbourhood improvement plan in place and continue working to act on the feedback we’ve received to improve our services. We aim to make sure dissatisfaction is less than 20%.
Some of the improvements we have introduced recently include:
- More frequent inspections to ensure quality of work in our communal spaces and green areas. We are planning to carry out random quality audits and use these outcomes to review and help influence the shape of our services going forward.
- Agreeing a new window cleaning contractor which we aim to be in place from the middle of the summer 2024.
- Identifying where we can make improvements to our overall soft landscape features with things like additional planting and cleaning of pathways.
Throughout the year (March 2023 to April 2024), we also carried out neighbourhood action days. We focussed these in particular on areas where dissatisfaction around the quality of the neighbourhood and communal spaces was lowest, to help us to understand how residents feel and what we could do to make improvements.
Our Estates team continue to consider all developing technologies that can improve the delivery of our services both for residents and colleagues. The team will also continue the rollout of commercial powered battery equipment that is quieter to use and use of greener more environmentally friendly cleaning products.
