2014/15
Annual Report to Residents Accent Nene Annual Report to Residents Accent Nene
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2014/15 www.accentgroup.org
1. Young gardeners of the future learn with our school project. 2. Celebrating the completion of The Swifts, Fulbourn, April 2015.
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Great homes in great communities. That’s our vision for the places where we work. Our aim is to improve our homes and services year on year and to work in partnership with our communities to make them a success. And, in these challenging economic times, we are committed to running our business efficiently to deliver the best quality services
for the best value for money. We know our residents and communities face challenges. We are determined to work with you to rise to those challenges. We have listened to you and set targets for improving the things which matter to you most.
Our performance is checked by our regulator, the Homes and Communities Agency. This report sets out how we are doing where you live and how we will be looking to do even better in the year ahead.
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3. Chief Executive Gordon Perry is joined by local councillors to plant a commemorative tree at Fulbourn. 4. A garden to be proud of at Cotton End, Peterborough.
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Group highlights
Our perfomance – at a glance
• Spending £34m improving our homes.
• 98% of all calls answered.
• Improving our repairs service.
• 82% satisfaction with overall service.
• Offering a better service for our customers who contact us.
• 82% satisfaction with anti-social behaviour service.
• Developing around 400 homes for rent, shared ownership and sale, including the completion of our eight-year regeneration of the Fulbourn estate.
• 95% of your repairs completed first time.
• Helping more than 1000 residents and bringing in more than £200,000 in extra income through our money advice teams.
• 314 new families re-housed.
• 94% satisfaction with repairs. • 92% of repairs appointments kept.
• 181 vulnerable residents helped. • £3m invested in your homes.
• Investing more than £175,000 in community activities across our regions including youth schemes, digital inclusion and handyman services.
• £3.9m saved across Accent by better buying of goods and services.
We welcome your views on how we’re doing so please get in touch…
• Making big savings in the way we run our business so that we can deliver more on the frontline. • Tackling rent arrears and cutting the time homes are empty before they can be relet.
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Keeping you involved We want to make it as easy as possible for you to contact us when you need to. You can get in touch in a variety of ways. We have introduced an 0345 phone number, which charges at a local rate, and our telephone opening hours now run from 8am to 8pm Monday to Friday and from 8am to 12pm on Saturday. Our local offices are open from 9am to 5pm, Monday to Friday. You can also contact us via text and email or log an enquiry via our website and we are also on Facebook and Twitter. We are keen to hear your views on our services. Our residents’ panel meets regularly and there are also a number of local and estate events where you can have your say.
Your homes Providing good quality homes is at the heart of what we do. We have set our own ‘Accent property standard’, which is higher than the decent homes standard that all homes should meet. It includes working to ensure all homes have features such as double glazing, over bath showers, hard-wired smoke detectors, carbon monoxide detectors,
Annual Report to Residents Accent Nene
extractor fans in kitchens and bathrooms, adequate loft insulation, anti-slip flooring and safe outdoor areas. We have invested more in our assisted decorating and gardening scheme which supports tenants who need extra help maintaining their homes and gardens.
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1. Panel members Julie Petrucci and Jo Cowe at the Swifts completion ceremony. 2. Collecting residents’ views are essential for improving service.
2014/15 www.accentgroup.org
What happens when things go wrong We answered 98% of telephone calls in an average speed of 10 seconds. Residents who visit us in person wait no longer than five minutes to be seen. We have run sessions on effective complaints handling for our staff and are planning further training this year. Of the complaints we received last year, 84% were resolved within our target time and 79% of those who complained were satisfied with the outcome. Our independent survey shows 82% of residents are satisfied overall and 60% are satisfied that we listen and respond to their views. We will be doing further work on the way we involve residents over the next year.
We have a robust complaints procedure. In the first instance, we would ask you to contact your housing officer to try to resolve your problem quickly. If need be, your complaint can be referred to a manager or the regional housing director. We have regular meetings with staff and residents to discuss complaints handling and we follow up cases with all residents who are unhappy with how their case has been handled.
How we’re doing: Over the past year, our local offices dealt with more than 38,000 contacts – 69% of which was by telephone, 14% in person, 8% by letter and 9% by email.
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3. Residents enjoying the 50’s themed tea dance at St Mark’s Hall, Peterborough, January 2015.
Annual Report to Residents Accent Nene
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How we’re doing: More than 97% of our homes currently meet the decent homes standard. All of our homes meet gas safety standards. Over the last year, we spent more than £3m on planned maintenance and 96.8% of residents who had planned work carried out on their homes were satisfied with the service. Overall, 94.3% were satisfied with our repairs service –
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up from 88% last year. 94.9% of repairs were completed first time; 92.2% of repairs appointments were kept and on average it took 8.2 days to complete a repair. We will have a new regional repairs contract in place in April next year and will continue to work with our contractors to improve resident satisfaction with repairs.
2014/15 www.accentgroup.org
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1. Happy residents enjoy their home and garden.
We know that having a is about more than just Letting your homes
Your community
It’s important that our homes are let in a fair, transparent and efficient way. We aim to offer a range of homes for different needs and to make the best use of our stock both for existing residents and for those who want a home. We want to make sure that when a resident leaves, their home can be re-let quickly to someone who needs it. And we also want to ensure that rents are collected efficiently.
We know that having a great place to live is about more than just your own home. It’s also about your neighbourhood and the opportunities it offers. That’s why we are determined to ensure our neighbourhoods are clean, safe and secure and to make tackling anti-social behaviour a priority. Over the past year, we have been focusing on settling longstanding anti-social behaviour issues. We’ve also continued our investment in community projects to bring residents together. Over the next year, we’ll be looking at making it easier for you to tell us your priorities about keeping your neighbourhood looking great.
We have a range of different housing options, from social and affordable rented homes to shared ownership and market rent properties. We work closely with local authorities to ensure homes are allocated effectively. We have local lettings plans in place to tackle anti-social behaviour issues. We are also working to support residents to stay in their home, particularly in the light of welfare reform and the extra pressures on residents’ budgets that creates.
How we’re doing We handled 181 referrals to our tenancy sustainability service and 158 anti-social behaviour cases. 82% were satisfied both with the way their case was handled and the outcome. Our independent survey shows 79% of residents were satisfied with their neighbourhood as a place to live. 55% were satisfied that their service charge represents value for money.
How we’re doing Over the past year, we dealt with 314 lets. Our average re-let time was 16.8 days, compared with 17.6 days in the previous year. We have reduced our arrears by £178,000 from 4.1% to 3%. Our arrears for homeowner service charges remain low at 1.9% or around £27,000.
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2. Moving to a single contact centre will improve the customer experience.
great place to live your own home… Value for money Running our business efficiently means we can put more money into our services and deliver more homes for those who need them. We want Accent to be a modern, streamlined business that can respond quickly and effectively to the needs of the communities where we work.
Over the next year, our priorities include:
Over the last year, our focus on delivering value for money has included: • Saving £3.9m across the group through better purchasing of goods and services.
• Putting in place new cost-effective regional contracts for our repairs services to save £4m a year across the group.
• Bringing down rent arrears across the group by more than £750,000.
• Saving £500,000 by reletting empty properties quicker.
• Planning the sale of difficult-to-let properties including sheltered housing schemes with the proceeds to be reinvested in new affordable housing.
• Ensuring more customer queries are resolved first time. • Further increasing the use of IT to reduce costs.
• Converting surplus office space into new affordable homes.
• Saving £500,000 by reducing the time properties are left empty before they are re-let.
• Standardising our staff terms and conditions, saving around £50,000.
• Moving to a single customer contact centre to improve the quality and consistency of service when you contact us.
• Making better use of IT, including mobile working for staff and moving more communications with customers online.
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2014/15 www.accentgroup.org
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We welcome your views on how we’re doing so please get in touch… 0345 678 0595 peterborough@accentgroup.org @accentpb /accentpb
Manor House, 57 Lincoln Road, Peterborough, PE1 2RR