Resident Focus Project

• The HUB consultation group have recently reviewed new and updated policies associated with Compensation, Damp & Mould, Fire Safety and Repairs & Maintenance. The feedback is being reviewed and considered for amendments. These will go to Committee soon for their approval.
• A recommendation from the Pennington’s consultation was to review the onboarding process to provide a clear and effective central resource for inductions for new staff, streamlining and standardising their starter experience. In response to this we have relaunched the Starter Hub on our staff site. This includes resources for both the new employee and their manager with links to both corporate and job specific information.
• We are pleased the Compliance Manager (Fleur McNeil) and Head of Repairs & Maintenance (Beverly Andrewes) have joined the Property Services within the Housing Division. Both bring a wealth of knowledge, plenty skills and experience which will feed into improving our processes to better maintain your home and your estate, to ensure your safety and satisfaction of where you live.

• Members have approved the new version of the Complaints policy. The Complaints policy has been updated in line with the Housing Ombudsman advice.
• You may have heard we have gone out to tender for the new Repairs and Maintenance contract. Whilst this is happening staff are still meeting with the current contractors to address any service issues.
• Over the next few weeks all estate offices will be fitted with new hearing loops. These hearing loops ensure we are accessible to our residents/service users, supporting them with their queries.

• We informed you that various strategies and reports are being written to provide an overview of the direction and priorities. These include a Housing Management Strategy, Asset Management Strategy, Housing Service Plan and Compliance Review. These are still underway.
• A suite of policies have been approved for extension at Committee held in June. Members asked for more detail in the Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (Treating Others Fairly) policy. We hope to have this approved soon along with others which have been shared with staff for consultation.
• As we are reviewing and drafting new policies there is a need to review our processes in some areas. Staff across all areas of Housing and Property Services and contractors continue to meet and discuss improving our procedures to deliver a better service to you.

• We are pleased to say the policies we took to Committee in early May have been approved. These are the policies relating to Asbestos Management, Electrical Safety, Lift Safety, Water Safety and Reasonable Adjustments. They have been added to our other policies on our 'Housing Policies' page. These policies shape our processes so we can deliver an excellent, effective and consistent service to you.
• We have successfully recruited for the position of Compliance Manager. The Compliance Manager will oversee the effective management of the “Big Six” - fire, electrical, water, lifts, gas and asbestos.
• Staff are continuing to have collaborative meetings to discuss various procedures where we hope to improve to deliver a more effective service. Having discussions about responsibilities and improvement opportunities, creating written procedures and user guides for staff, you should soon see an improved streamlined, consistent and fair approach to our services and commitment to you, our residents.
• The Equality, Diversity and Inclusion policy as well as other policies are due for renewal, and we are hoping to have these approved in Committee in June. The policies that are due for renewal have had no significant change so do not currently require a re-write.
• More policies are being drafted and have been sent to staff for consultation. These include Damp & Mould, Empty Properties (Void), Recharges and Repairs & Maintenance. Once the feedback has been reviewed these will be shared with the Housing User Board for resident feedback. For information on joining the HUB, check our 'Get involved on your estate' page.

• We have received a good pool of applications for the permanent Head of Repairs and Maintenance post. The interviews are being held in May and we hope to have someone in post soon. The Head of Repairs and Maintenance will take forward recommendations and improvements to drive a better service across all our Estates.
• We contracted Ark Consulting Ltd to carry out two Asset Management Strategies one for the Barbican and one for the City’s council housing. The purpose of having such strategy is to give strategic direction to our investment in our homes. Members, residents and staff will all be involved in the work so expect contact from the team (Jerry Gilbert (Barbican) Richard Medley (Council Housing) and Kieran Colgan. If they get in touch or you are invited to meetings I am sure you will all be helpful. This report is due in June 2024.
• Most of the new service standards are now completed and will now be published in May. The standards cover important areas like repairs, rents and money matters, tenancy management and antisocial behaviour and explain what residents can expect from us in each of these areas.
• Pennington Choices continue to conduct a detailed review of how we manage the ‘big six’ safety compliance activities for fire, electrical, water, lifts, gas and asbestos. The Housing Compliance Manager role has been advertised. The Compliance Manager will oversee the effective management of the “Big Six” mentioned above.
• A new KPI dashboard has been created for use of the Housing staff. This dashboard provides an overview of data and visual trends of services we provide to our residents. Using this dashboard, we can better log and report on our data relating to services such as ASB, Repairs, Right to Buy applications received etc. We will also be able to better spot patterns and improvement opportunities to provide an excellent service to you.
• Various meetings are being held to discuss our procedures. It was identified in the Pennington Choices report that the service you receive is not always consistent. Having discussions about responsibilities and improvement opportunities, creating written procedures and user guides for staff, you should see improvement in a streamlined, consistent and fair approach to our services and commitment to our residents.
• Unfortunately, the Housing Sub-Committee has been delayed to 1 May. We are hoping policies we have drafted in relation to some of our compliance activities are approved then. These will be readily available online.

• New and completed policies for Asbestos Management, Electrical Safety, Lift Safety, Water Hygiene Safety, Reasonable Adjustments and Equality, Diversity and Inclusion will be being taken to Committee for approval this month. Once approved they will be shared with colleagues and residents.
• Most of the new service standards are now completed and will be published later this month. The standards cover important areas like repairs, rents and money matters, tenancy management and antisocial behaviour and explain what residents can expect from us in each of these areas.
• Pennington Choices continue to conduct a detailed review of how we manage the ‘big six’ safety compliance activities for fire, electrical, water, lifts, gas and asbestos. The Housing Compliance Manager role has been advertised. The Compliance Manager will oversee the effective management of the “Big Six” mentioned above.
• The Housing Service Development Plan 2024-2026 has been drafted and shared with colleagues to comment. This overview gives the department direction and a clear plan of improvement opportunities across the service.

December 

• A dedicated project manager started in post, who will oversee progress on the Resident Focus Project
• TPAS continued their work on our new resident involvement framework, hold engagement sessions for residents and staff. These were well attended and we gathered plenty of valuable feedback on how our new involvement mechanisms might work

January 2024

• Work continues on drafting a new suite of policies, including several related to safety compliance
• Service standards for key topics are finalised and will be completed in February 2024, once service managers have reviewed them
• The idea of a housing Contact Centre is being developed in more detail and will move towards staff consultation in late February
• Pennington Choices were appointed to conduct a detailed review of how we manage ‘big six’ safety compliance activities for fire, electrical, water, lifts, gas and asbestos. This is due to finish in March 2024
• Our new Handbooks for tenants and Leaseholders are now being designed. These will be taken forward to consultation with residents in the Spring

February

• Work continues on drafting a new suite of policies, including several related to safety compliance
• The Resident Involvement Team have received the TPAS report and are reviewing the information about the new clear and transparent resident communication strategy and plan.
• Staff across all areas have completed Positive Impact (Customer Services) Training. Team Managers have also attended an embedding session to take the training forward.
• Workshops have been held with staff about the idea of a “single point of contact” for residents. Many ideas and perspectives were shared about the benefits, implications and best practices for a Housing Contact Centre.
• Pennington Choices have been appointed to conduct a detailed review of how we manage ‘big six’ safety compliance activities for fire, electrical, water, lifts, gas and asbestos. This is due to finish in March 2024
• Our new Handbooks for tenants and Leaseholders are now being designed. These will be taken forward to consultation with residents in the Spring

September

• We have agreed a schedule for the work to be carried out by TPAS to formulate a new resident involvement and influence strategy. This will start in October 2023 and finish in January 2024.
• A set of new Service Standards has been drafted and these will begin to be rolled out to staff and residents in October. They cover important areas like repairs, rents and money matters, tenancy management and antisocial behaviour and explain what residents can expect from us in each of these areas
• Recruitment of a Compliance Manager is underway, who will review our management of key safety processes relating to the ‘big six’ – lifts, gas, electrics, water hygiene, fire risk and asbestos. This will build on significant work already done in this area in response to new building safety regulations
• The new Housing Management Strategy is in its final stages of development. This new plan reflects feedback from residents, staff and Members on what our priorities should be for the short to medium term
• Progress has been made on formulating design principles for a potential central contact centre function for Housing and Repairs, which would provide a first point of contact for housing and repairs queries and handle correspondence through email and letter
• Following a detailed analysis of job roles, a training plan is being developed to ensure staff receive relevant training, at appropriate intervals, to help them in their roles
• A plan has been developed to improve how we induct and train new staff. Resources are being written for our staff intranet to ensure that every receives an appropriate induction according to their specific job role

October

• A ‘skills scan’ of each job role was completed, which will be used to help create a training plan for our team
• Work continued on the Service Standards – these are now at an advanced stage and, following initial feedback from service managers, further changes will be made to get them ready for publication
• Work continues on drafting new policies and procedures and several new policies are complete

November

• Several staffing changes in the Housing and Property Services teams have taken place, which has resulted in some delays to certain actions in the project plan while work is handed over to new staff members
• The Assistant Director for Housing & Barbican and the Head of Repairs and Maintenance left their posts and interim staff are now in place, who will help drive forward the actions in the project plan
• A draft training plan for staff was created following a ‘skills scan’ – this will inform our training priorities over the coming 12-18 months
• Training will start with customer service sessions, commencing in January. This will be delivered to staff across Housing, Property Services and the Barbican Estate team
• A new Tenants’ Handbook and a similar handbook for leaseholders are being created – we are currently agreeing the wording for the handbooks before moving on to the design stage and planning the consultation with residents

July

• The Customer Service and Repairs Review has been given a new identity – the Resident Focus Project. Future communications will appear under this branding, to help you keep track of the work being done following the external review. Please look out for our new logo on future updates and in the '@Home' newsletter and magazine.
• A project plan has been finalised and timescales allocated (this will be updated regularly and will appear on this page)
• A project group has been initiated, with colleagues across Housing and Repairs taking part
• Work is well underway on several recommendations and some have already been completed
• A list of ‘missing’ policies has been compiled and work has started on drafting these
• Six new Customer Service Standards have been drafted, including Antisocial Behaviour, Home Ownership, Repairs & Maintenance and Allocations & Lettings. A total of twelve new standards will be introduced, which explain what residents can expect from us in key areas of housing and repairs customer service
• A suite of Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) and associated ‘scorecards’ have been developed and finalised, monthly performance tracking will start in July. This information will be used to report in more detail to residents on the Housing Service’s performance. It will also be scrutinised by senior managers, the Executive Director and Members
• Significant progress has been made on the new Housing Management Strategy, which is due in October 2023
• In July, we are carrying out a skills and training assessment for all staff in Housing, to identify training and development needs aimed at improving the customer service you receive as residents

 July

• We have appointed TPAS, the tenant engagement experts, to assist us in creating our new Resident Involvement Strategy. This will set out how we aim to improve the way we involve and listen to residents, and better enable them to influence the services we deliver
• A summary of the review’s findings, including the feedback received from residents, Members and staff, has been published on the web page
• A training needs analysis has been completed by job type and this is going to be added to the updated training plan for the Housing Team. Training to be prioritised includes customer service, communications skills, equality and diversity and effective complaints handling
• Nine of the eleven new Service Standards have been drafted and will be finalised in August
• New policies are being drafted and many are on track to be approved at Committee in the Autumn of 2023. The new policies drafted so far include Tenancy Management, Fire Safety, Leasehold Management and Repairs
• We are finalising our improvements to intranet resources for staff, which tell them which team or individual is responsible each part of the Housing Service, to help them when resolving residents’ queries. Work has also started on improving our induction process for new staff
• Walkabouts and drop-ins have been reviewed and a new schedule created, which will be published shortly and take us well into 2024
• Our performance indicators have been finalised and a draft ‘dashboard’ is being evaluated at the time of writing, which will be finalised by the first week in August
• Discussions have begun about the recommended central contact centre function. Staff will be involved in these discussions in August 2023 before options are finalised

August

• New Service Standards in a range of areas are now drafted and will be finalised in September
• We are finalising the new Performance Dashboard, which will give details of performance across Housing and Repairs; this will be ready in early September
• TPAS (Tenant Participation Advisory Service) has been appointed to help us create a new resident involvement plan and associated processes, to improve resident influence on service delivery