Industry News
Consultation on new tenant satisfaction measures underway
T
he Regulator of Social Housing is consulting on a new set of tenant satisfaction measures, as proposed in the
Government’s Social Housing White Paper, but the closing date for responses is imminent. Te Social Housing White Paper was published
over a year ago in November 2020. It outlined what social housing residents should expect from their landlords and sought to rebalance the relationship between residents and landlords, and enable residents to hold their landlord to account and understand how they are performing. Te proposed tenant satisfaction measures are
among the tools that could be used to do this. Tey are intended to provide a set of clear, comparable metrics on issues that matter to residents, and would be applied to housing associations, local authorities and other registered housing providers. Te measures would enable residents to hold
their landlords to account, and allow the regulator to ensure that housing associations (and other social housing providers) are delivering on consumer regulation. Tey would be used alongside other tools to gain assurance from social housing providers on compliance. Te consultation is open until 3 March 2022, and
it seeks views on 22 tenant satisfaction measures across five themes from the white paper:
• Keeping properties in good repair. • Maintaining building safety. • Effective complaints handling. • Respectful and helpful tenant management. • Responsible neighbourhood management.
Twelve of these will be measured using a perception survey, while the remaining 10 will be measured using housing providers’ management information. Tis could include complaints handling, building
The consultation is also proposing a new Tenant Satisfaction Measure standard. To comply with this, housing associations will need to meet detailed technical and tenant perception survey requirements
safety, neighbourhood management, repairs and stock quality information. Te consultation is also proposing a new
Tenant Satisfaction Measure standard. To comply with this, housing associations will need to meet detailed technical and tenant perception survey requirements. Te proposals represent a significant U-turn
from the Government and the regulator as they previously scrapped the use of performance indicators for comparing services delivered by different social landlords. However, in the aſtermath of the Grenfell tragedy some four and a half years ago, it has faced repeated calls to focus on performance issues and particularly those relating to the health and safety of tenants. Te Levelling Up Housing and Communities
select committee has also started its work looking at the effectiveness of social housing regulation. Commenting on the committee’s first open session in January, housing guru Alistair McIntosh described the sector as a ‘fact free zone’ and said collecting analysing and publishing facts about
conditions across the sector must be a top priority for any new regulatory regime. Speaking at the select committee hearing,
Suzanne Muna from the Social Housing Action Campaign was critical of the proposed tenant satisfaction measures. “Any of our members that we’ve talked to have just shrugged their shoulders and said ‘how will this help me?’ I can’t say that empowers tenants in any way,” she said. Ahead of launching the consultation back in
December the regulator had worked with others, including the National Housing Federation, in shaping the proposed measures through the Tenant Satisfaction Measure Sounding Board. It remains to be seen what other measures of service delivery are to be introduced within a more customer focused regulatory system.
HA awards a new 10-year repairs and maintenance contract
South-east based Moat has awarded a ten-year contract worth over £200 million to Morgan Sindall Property Services to deliver property repairs and maintenance services. Te contract will start from the beginning of
April 2022 with Morgan Sindall Property Services providing responsive repairs, out-of-hours services and void works to 11,500 of Moat’s 20,000 homes across south-east London, Kent, Essex and Sussex. Te contract is for an initial period of ten years with the option to extend for a further five
years and has the flexibility to include additional requirements, such as cyclical redecoration and building safety works. Moat’s tenants were heavily involved in the
multi-stage tender exercise with evaluation based on an assessment of both cost and quality of service, focusing heavily on customer experience and high- quality service delivery. Steve Nunn, Executive Director of New Business
and Development, said: “Te delivery of a high- quality, customer-focused service is of paramount
18 | HMMFebruary/March 2022 |
www.housingmmonline.co.uk
importance to us, so it was great to have so much customer involvement in the tender process and to have their input at the heart of this new contract. “We look forward to working with Morgan
Sindall Property Services who clearly demonstrated in the tender process how they will deliver an exceptional service that meets the diverse needs of our customers, alongside exciting social initiatives for our communities.” Alan Hayward, Managing Director of Morgan
Sindall Property Services, said: “We are so pleased to be working Moat who clearly share our values and are passionate about delivering a high- quality service and the best possible experience to customers. We are looking forward to delivering social value initiatives which are relevant and engaging for customers and communities.”
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