CUSTOMER ANNUAL REPORT 2014/15
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Your Housing Group Customer Annual Report 2014 / 15
Introduction from Kathy Cowell
About Us
04
06 Key Facts
Homes
08 Value for Money
10 Neighbourhoods
16
22 Customer Involvement
How to Contact Us
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35 Your Housing Group Customer Annual Report 2014 / 15
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A year of challenges and rewards 4
Your Housing Group Customer Annual Report 2014 / 15
2014/15 has certainly been a memorable year for us all here at Your Housing Group – a year which has been both challenging and rewarding and which has seen our staff go the extra mile to ensure we remain customer-focussed, financially strong and ambitious about the future. I know that as customers, you have a keen interest in how we are performing and I’m proud of the fact that we have been able to increase our surplus this year to £17.1m while at the same time making efficiency savings of £3.1m. The profits we make mean that we can invest in new and existing homes and other projects for our customers. We’ve completed our Affordable Homes Programme - building 1,335 new homes, launched our new private rented brand, Hive, in Warrington town centre and been named as Employer of the Year at the Cheshire Business Awards to name but a few highlights. But I also know that it is how you feel about us as a landlord, how we look after your home and your neighbourhood that is of huge importance to you. And so it is a source of real pride that over 83% of you remained satisfied with the services you received from us last year and I look forward to pushing that figure higher in the years to come as we strive to improve and shape our services in line with your expectations. We’ve already recognised that we needed to make it easier for you to get involved with us and to influence the way we do things. Our new customer involvement structure allows you to do just that – at times and in ways which suit you best and I’m
delighted that so many of you have already taken us up on the offer to really get involved. There are more than 50 Customer Involvement Panels (CIPs) now up and running and I am confident that this number will continue to grow. Last year also presented us with some significant challenges around gas servicing which led us to embark on what is known as a Voluntary Undertaking (VU). This far reaching review of the business impacted on virtually all departments and led to changes in the ways in which we carry out a lot of our work. As difficult as those times were, they have made us stronger as an organisation and resulted in us achieving an improved rating from the Homes & Communities Agency which is a credit to the very many people who worked tirelessly and went the extra mile for Your Housing Group. I hope that you find this year’s Customer Annual Report of interest and that the passion, pride and creativity shown by our teams of dedicated staff shines through in what you read. Best wishes,
Kathy Cowell OBE DL Chair, Your Housing Group
Your Housing Group Customer Annual Report 2014 / 15
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ABOUT US
Passion, Pride and Creativity: Who we are and what we do 6
Your Housing Group Customer Annual Report 2014 / 15
Transforming lives and communities
Your Housing Group is one of the largest providers of affordable housing in the UK, managing 33,000 homes across the North West, Yorkshire and the Midlands. We provide:
Affordable homes to rent
Homes for sale, both outright and through shared ownership
Community regeneration, creating sustainable neighbourhoods
Sheltered and supported accommodation for older people
Hostels and foyers which support vulnerable people.
Our vision is “transforming lives and communities” and we achieve this through the delivery of our corporate values of Passion, Pride and Creativity.
PASSION
PRIDE
CREATIVITY
What this means
What this means
What this means
TRANSFORMING LIVES
BEING THE BEST
DOING THINGS DIFFERENTLY
IT’S ABOUT…
IT’S ABOUT…
IT’S ABOUT…
a genuine desire to support customers to transform their lives Exceptional service for customers and colleagues Placing the customer and one another at the heart of what we do
eing the very best you b can everyday
being prepared to do things differently
oing the right thing for D customers and colleagues Achieving targets so we can invest in the future
Being excited by new opportunities and ideas Taking a positive approach to problem solving
Your Housing Group Customer Annual Report 2014 / 15
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KEY FACTS
£170.3m
£17.1m
turnover
surplus
1,297
33,227 homes
staff
£32m
£76m
on repairs & maintenance
100%
spent on building new homes
Decent Homes Standard performance
Key Facts 8
Your Housing Group Customer Annual Report 2014 / 15
£
83.2% overall satisfaction
96%
905
ÂŁ18m in social value
ASB resolutions
50 Customer Involvement Panels
complaints
ÂŁ31k
Investors in People
Employer of the Year
raised for charity
690 volunteer hours
GOLD
Cheshire Business Awards
accredited
Kathy Cowell Most Effective Board Member Women in Housing Award 2014 Your Housing Group Customer Annual Report 2014 / 15
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HOMES
Quality Counts: Your Place, Our Promise 10
Your Housing Group Customer Annual Report 2014 / 15
Investing in homes we can be proud of
Owning homes we can be proud of and investing in neighbourhoods we can help to transform are key commitments for Your Housing Group and in 2014/15, we kick-started a new programme called ‘Quality Counts: Your Place, Our Promise’ to help us to do just that. The first stage was to map out all of the properties we own and then to look at all of the following things; > The condition of our homes and how they perform from a financial point of view – for example, are they profitable, do they break-even or do they cost us money?;
We’ve called the programme Quality Counts: Your Place, Our Promise because; > Quality is the key the quality of homes, environments and communities; > Your Place
> What investment our properties will need in the future;
because this can apply to a home or a location and we are talking about both and;
> Whether the tenure mix is still right;
> Our Promise
> What the demand for property is in areas;
because we are clear that we are promising to make decisions which make a difference to people’s homes and lives in a positive way – irrespective of whether that means we continue to be their landlord or not.
> What wider community issues exist that affect a neighbourhood and how you feel about living there. Once we’ve completed that work, we’ll then produce a series of community and neighbourhood plans which will set out our proposals for the future of the properties we own and also for our involvement in, and vision for, the communities in which we are based.
£32m spent on repairs and maintenance
Your Housing Group Customer Annual Report 2014 / 15
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HOMES
A story to warm your home 12
Your Housing Group Customer Annual Report 2014 / 15
Investing in homes we can be proud of
We’re committed to making sure that the homes we provide are well maintained, safe and warm but also we recognise that we should take steps to ensure they are well insulated so we can do our bit to keep energy costs as low as possible. With a grant of £800,000, Leasowe Community Homes (LCH) has been able to install cavity wall insulation to around 600 homes, helping to reduce energy bills for nearly 200 customers by £200 per year. The project was shortlisted for The National Green Deal & ECO Awards earlier this year and our supplier, Community Keep Warm, was also named as the North West England Insulation & Fabric Installer of the Year 2014. More homes are scheduled to benefit later in 2015. Customers in a further 450 homes in the Your Moorlands area also benefitted from a similar, government backed scheme, as did over 180 properties in Manchester helping us to save around £260,000 in energy costs last year.
77.5% satisfaction with repairs
83% satisfaction with condition of home As a responsible landlord, not only are we pleased that we can attract grants like this, to see the energy savings they bring for you, but also by doing so, we can promote environmental sustainability and our commitment to it as a business. Cara Dunne of Oxley Avenue in Leasowe said: “With energy bills rising all the time, anything that can be done to help keep our costs as low as possible – and our homes as warm as possible – has got to be a good thing. I’m really happy with the work that was done and the savings I’ve been able to make!”
Your Housing Group Customer Annual Report 2014 / 15
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HOMES
Two become one in Anfield 14
Your Housing Group Customer Annual Report 2014 / 15
Investing in homes we can be proud of
The redevelopment of Anfield, the famous home of Liverpool FC, has often overshadowed the sheer amount of blood, sweat and tears that has been shed as part of the wider regeneration of the area over recent years, but with an investment programme worth more than £23million, more than 204 new and refurbished homes already delivered and an estimated further investment of £10m expected in the next three years, Anfield is fast becoming a location of choice. Some of the work we’ve already completed includes the restoration of historic terraced homes and innovative refurbishment projects, which have seen smaller traditional terraced houses combined to create larger quality family homes, like those in Gurnall and Saker Street, while conversions have also taken place in neighbouring streets too. All in all, over 70 new houses have been created as part of the 2-into-1s initiative, with a waiting list of local residents being given priority for the new re-modelled homes. The conversions are part of a £260m regeneration plan which will transform the Anfield area and breathe life into north Liverpool. The further regeneration will include new housing, improved shopping facilities and public spaces, office buildings, a hotel and the creation of a major new pedestrian-friendly avenue and public square.
Our Chair, Kathy Cowell, said: “The Anfield project is about so much more than bricks and mortar. It’s about improving opportunities for residents and helping to build a strong and vibrant community. Employment and skills are right at the heart of that. Your Housing Group is all about transforming lives and communities and turning them in to places which people want to be a part of.”
22,612 gas inspections
Your Housing Group Customer Annual Report 2014 / 15
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VALUE FOR MONEY
Merseyside harnesses the power of Zoopla to avoid rent loss 16
Your Housing Group Customer Annual Report 2014 / 15
Making every penny count
We take the re-letting of our properties seriously and advertise our properties widely to make sure we get a quick change over and maintain our rental income. Following last year’s financial review, we realised that it was becoming increasingly difficult to let our 3 - 4 bed properties via our usual Choice Based Lettings agreement and so we started working with Zoopla and other commercial organisations to help us to re-let our properties and reduce the number of empty properties. As well as the obvious benefit of Zoopla being the top Google search result for properties to rent, the benefits of using on-line services like this are also; > Instant uploads to the website which increase the chances of same day lets; > Interest from a larger pool of potential customers; > Access to instant reports; > Reductions in advertising costs overall. During our pilot period in March 2014, we advertised 23 hard to let properties for the Merseyside region. After just four months, 13 of these hard to let properties were rented via Zoopla, which meant that we had a rent loss saving of over £4,880.
£85.29
average weekly rent Because of this success, we went on to advertise 144 properties in Merseyside last year and have seen our re-let days drop from 33.56 to 19.62 with improvements continuing month by month. For the forthcoming financial year, we will continue to lower the cost of allocations through developing creative approaches to advertising and administering applicants. We plan to widen our client group and appeal to new customers. It is anticipated that this will help the Group generate savings that can be allocated elsewhere.
£17.1m surplus Your Housing Group Customer Annual Report 2014 / 15
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VALUE FOR MONEY
A helping hand on rent arrears 18
Your Housing Group Customer Annual Report 2014 / 15
Making every penny count
We appreciate that whilst it’s really important that rent is paid on time, from time to time people can find it difficult to manage their money. Last year, our Money Advice teams supported over 1,800 customers by offering confidential advice on all things personal finance related, including how to prioritise payments and reduce debts. Their advice helped customers to claim a total of £1.5 million, of which £462,232 was paid to us in rent and they were also able to help in terms of resolving rent or arrears concerns, maintaining tenancies, sourcing alternative housing options, offering debt advice, help with budgeting, benefit claims and appeals, completing CVs and getting back into work, as well as helping customers set up direct debits and bank accounts ready for the transfer to Universal Credit. When a customer reached £1,162 of rent arrears and was struggling to keep up with payments due to illness, one of our income support officers offered help. He told us: “The gentleman had no family or friends in the area to support him and had a severe illness that was causing eye sight issues. I spoke to our Income Collection Team and Tenancy Support Officer who immediately referred him to a local food bank who delivered a food parcel that same day. “The team was also able to provide additional help with every day tasks such as opening post, dealing with utilities, making payment arrangements and setting up direct debits.
“With his illness getting increasingly worse, the team was able to make a number of adaptions to his property too, including fitting a carpet on his concrete floor and fitting wardrobes to reduce trip hazards in the house and to help him find his clothes more easily.” To help the customer clear his debts, the team compiled an in-depth review of his finances and pulled together a payment plan. “We offered the gentleman some welfare benefits advice and helped him gain access to housing benefit. After a short while, we were able to see improvements in his payments and his debt now stands at a little over £150 which means he is continuing to sustain his tenancy”.
£3.1m efficiency savings
Your Housing Group Customer Annual Report 2014 / 15
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VALUE FOR MONEY
Why value for money is so important to us – and should be to you! 20
Your Housing Group Customer Annual Report 2014 / 15
Making every penny count
Value for money, or ensuring that we make every penny count, runs right through everything we do at Your Housing Group and it’s one of the reasons our financial position remains strong and stable and that we have received the highest possible rating for financial viability. In 2014 / 15, we increased our surplus – or the amount of money we saved – by 25% to £17.1 million and at the same time, made savings of over £3 million by doing our work differently. This included; > £1.5 million from a corporate restructure; > £702,000 from reviewing how and where we buy services and products from; > £430,000 from reviewing our gas servicing and repairs contracts; > £262,000 in energy efficiency costs; > £100,000 by providing health & safety in-house. Making the most of the money we receive is not only the right thing to do but it also means that we are better able to invest in our homes and services and to make improvements. We work hard to support people who find it difficult to pay their rent on time and in 2014/15, we helped nearly 2,000 customers to claim over £1.5million of benefits, of which £462,000 came to us as rent.
As an organisation with a commercial head and a social heart, it’s also important that we understand the social value of the community projects we support and last year, this was worth an equivalent of £18million and included supporting over 800 people into work, more than 4,300 older people into projects to reduce isolation and engaging 2,000 young people in projects to help them with life skills, finding work and improving their well-being.
54% reduced void loss
Your Housing Group Customer Annual Report 2014 / 15
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NEIGHBOURHOODS & COMMUNITIES
Football is inspired choice to reduce anti-social behaviour 22
Your Housing Group Customer Annual Report 2014 / 15
Connecting our commercial head to our social heart
Here at Your Housing Group, we have a firm commitment to transforming lives and communities and one of the most rewarding parts of that is the work we do with young people. Last year, we worked with over 2,000 young people from right across the group to help tackle anti-social behaviour in our communities. In Partington, for example, we joined forces with the Manchester United Foundation to deliver a youth engagement programme called Street Reds, which brought together 129 young people in Partington and achieved a social value of over £800,000.
3,137 ASB cases The programme, for both boys and girls, takes place every Friday night and uses the power of football to engage and inspire young people who might otherwise become involved in anti-social behaviour. Not only does it help with general health and wellbeing, but it also encourages those taking part to volunteer and gain qualifications, building on their confidence and skills to help them into employment in the future.
Often, as part of the sessions, the coaches will sit down with the young people and discuss local issues that may be concerning them. One young person on the programme said: “It’s nice to be here on a Friday night especially when it gets dark, as we often feel scared walking around in small groups with nothing to do. “The session gives us a chance to play football against other teams in the area in a safe environment, otherwise we’d be playing on a street somewhere. “There are good opportunities from attending the session too. I am looking forward to when I’m 16 and can volunteer to help out, as I would love to become a coach in the future.”
£18m social value from 100 projects
Your Housing Group Customer Annual Report 2014 / 15
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NEIGHBOURHOODS & COMMUNITIES
Making the difference with our work clubs 24
Your Housing Group Customer Annual Report 2014 / 15
Connecting our commercial head to our social heart
Between 2014/15 we supported 811 of our customers into employment or to develop new skills. A major factor of this success is the weekly work club sessions held in Birchwood, Cheadle, Leek and Biddulph, in partnership with Support Staffordshire. These drop-in sessions offer a one-stop shop for all employment and benefit related queries, in a positive and supportive environment where job seekers can get the advice and help they need to secure the job they want. In addition to the support offered by staff, the Work Clubs have been run by a dedicated team of volunteers who give up their time to help others in our communities. Elaine Whorton, a Your Housing Group customer who lives in the Daisy Haye Retirement Living Scheme in Leek, has special needs and a hearing impairment which led to difficulties in understanding the new jobseeker obligations introduced in the Welfare Reform Act. With support from her employment and skills officer, Louise Harley, Elaine completed a number of training courses, secured a voluntary role at a local charity shop, and has now got herself a paid position at the Daisy Chain Café at Daisy Haye.
Louise said: “I’m really proud of the difference we’ve made to the lives of these people and their families, and the ripple effect of this in our communities is huge, with new people approaching us every day seeking to emulate the success of their friends and neighbours. Elaine is a great example of how getting a job can transform the lives of our customers.”
221 customers helped into work
Your Housing Group Customer Annual Report 2014 / 15
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NEIGHBOURHOODS & COMMUNITIES
Understanding differences to help support communities 26
Your Housing Group Customer Annual Report 2014 / 15
Connecting our commercial head to our social heart
We know that one size doesn’t fit all, so we do our best to make sure you have everything you need to get the latest news and updates. To do this effectively, we offer translation services to customers and this can take the form of translations into Braille, recording important documents onto a CD for people with restricted sight and providing Easy Read formats for customers who need a simplified version of documents. Letters are also regularly translated into different languages for our customers who are not fluent English readers. Your Tung Sing (YTS) was originally established to meet the housing needs of our Chinese community in central Manchester. Although we now house people from a wide range of ethnic backgrounds, a large number of its customers are still from a Chinese background and tend to be older people. With this in mind, we have developed a full health programme tailored to meet the unique needs of this group in partnership with the Chinese Health Information Centre.
4,328
This programme includes: > Health Walks to Hollingworth Lake, Blackpool, Llandudno and Southport, with an average of 90 Chinese Elders per trip. > Monthly “Memory Lane” club for people with dementia and their carers. > Weekly Tai Chi sessions for residents aged 55+. Your Tung Sing is now also delivering a “Click and Connect” session twice every month providing basic online skills training materials. The programme offers a personalised approach for each person and provides access to affordable tablet devices, laptops and touch screen desktop computers which can easily be configured to support Chinese language input. Our innovative approach in encouraging BME residents to get online has been nationally recognised by the Tinder Foundation and now forms part of their best practice case studies.
older people supported
Your Housing Group Customer Annual Report 2014 / 15
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CUSTOMER INVOLVEMENT
Getting involved in ways to suit you! 28
Your Housing Group Customer Annual Report 2014 / 15
Helping you to get involved
Whether you’ve got half an hour to spare every so often, half a day each month or you can give more time, our new approach to customer involvement launched earlier this year, which means that you can get involved with us in a way that suits you best. Building on what you have told us over the past year, we have redesigned how you can get involved so that you can take part as and when you like - informally or more formally. You can, for example, be a mystery shopper and test our services, complete surveys and give us ideas from the comfort of your armchair, hold us to account as member of one of our Customer Assurance Panels or take corporate responsibility by joining the Group Services Committee. In place of the previous Community Governance Groups (CGGs), we now have a mixture of Customer Involvement Panels (CIPs), regional Customer Assurance Panels (CAPs) and a Services Committee. Running alongside is a new training programme called Your Learning, which offers you the support and skills needed to successfully take part in customer involvement, scrutiny and governance enabling you to feel confident and equipped to get involved.
905
complaints
50+ Customer Involvement Panels
Someone who has been closely involved with the redevelopment is Dave Tomlinson, former Chair of Manchester’s Community Governance Group. He said: “Previously, we’ve focussed a lot on formal involvement, mainly through CGGs, but we knew that we needed to change and offer more choices to people. What this means is that some CGG members who don’t want to spend hours travelling to CGG meetings can continue to contribute at local levels, so we keep their valuable experience and knowledge, but it also means that we can enthuse new members to take part as well, building up the number of people who can help to make a difference.”
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CUSTOMER INVOLVEMENT
A helping hand when things go wrong 30
Your Housing Group Customer Annual Report 2014 / 15
Helping you to get involved
Although we try really hard to get it right every time, we recognise that sometimes you will have cause to complain and so when that happens, we want to make the process as easy as possible. Over the past year we have been working on improving our service and have put our staff through customer service training to ensure high levels of ownership when dealing with and investigating complaints, whilst being polite, professional and helpful. We endeavour to put things right when they’ve gone wrong but to also apologise when we have made mistakes. 27% of customers told us that delays in complaints handling were particularly frustrating, so the team has worked hard to ensure that throughout the process, we tell you about any likely delays to help relieve that frustration.
We carry out a lot of work to help prevent antisocial behaviour from happening in the first place, but where it does, we are also committed to resolving it. In 2014/15, just over 3,100 cases of anti-social behaviour were reported to us and we helped to find a solution for more than 96%. Our customer satisfaction rating was 85%. See the back page of this Customer Annual report for information about how to contact us if you’ve got a complaint or have concerns about anti-social behaviour.
We’ve also put in place a three-stage complaints process as follows: > Acknowledge complaints within 2 working days > Stage 1 target resolve time 10 working days > Stage 2 target resolve time 15 working days > Stage 3 target resolve time 25 working days Last year, we received 905 complaints – 92% were resolved at Stage 1, 7% moved to Stage 2 and just 1% were Stage 3. It’s important to us that you feel safe and happy in your home which is why we take a serious view about anyone causing anti-social behaviour in local neighbourhoods.
98% satisfaction for customer service
Your Housing Group Customer Annual Report 2014 / 15
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CUSTOMER INVOLVEMENT
Join us on our customer journey 32
Your Housing Group Customer Annual Report 2014 / 15
Helping you to get involved
In 2014/15, we set off on a journey – a journey to transform lives and communities, to build homes people can be proud of and to make decisions only to do things where we know we can make a real difference. But we aren’t on this journey alone and neither do we want to be. You, our customers, are key for much of what we do and we want you to come on a journey with us to help us to understand more clearly what your service expectations are of us, how reliable that service currently is and how easy – or otherwise – it is for you to access those services from us. And so we have launched a major programme – a customer journey mapping exercise – to look at all of these issues, to consult with you and to recommend options which will help shape how we deliver services in the future. We’re looking at; Customer expectations > What are your expectations? > What services do you receive from us now and what’s the level of that service? > Are we doing more or less than we need to be? > What would be the impact of changing what we offer?
270,591
Service reliability > How many times do you contact us and for what? > Do we do what we say we will and do we provide feedback or updates? > Do you trust us to take action when you ask us or do you have to contact us on multiple occasions before you get a resolution? > What do we need to fix? Customer effort > How easy is it for you to get something resolved? > Are we making it too hard? > What would or could you do to help change the service offer? > Can we encourage you to ‘channel shift’ and make service delivery effortless or as automated as possible? > How can we then target the real support where it is needed? The programme will report back to the Board in early 2016 and we will be keeping you posted as we go along.
customer calls Your Housing Group Customer Annual Report 2014 / 15
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CONTACT US
Here to help 34
Your Housing Group Customer Annual Report 2014 / 15
Get in touch!
There are lots of ways of getting in touch with us here at Your Housing Group. 0345 345 0272 response@yourhousinggroup.co.uk www.yourhousinggroup.co.uk You can also keep up to date with all our news and views by following us on social media /yourhousing @your_housing
If you need to complain: We promise to always take your complaint seriously and to do our best to put things right. If you have a complaint, you can contact us in a number of ways, either contact Your Response on 0345 345 0272 – email response@ yourhousinggroup.co.uk or alternatively visit our website www.yourhousinggroup.co.uk and fill in a complaints form online or visit your local community housing office. If you are worried about ASB: If you want to report an incident or anti-social behaviour you can either call 999 if in immediate danger, or if it is a non-emergency call 101. You can speak to Your Response on 0345 345 0272 and report anti-social behaviour 24 hours a day, 7 days a week or alternately visit our website www.yourhousinggroup.co.uk where you can fill in a form online.
Your Housing Group Customer Annual Report 2014 / 15
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YOUR HOUSING GROUP 602 ASTON AVENUE BIRCHWOOD WARRINGTON WA3 6ZN WWW.YOURHOUSINGGROUP.CO.UK @YOUR_HOUSING /YOURHOUSING