One year of direct housing management

We now have direct responsibility for more than 13,500 social rent homes across the borough alongside managing relationships with around 5,500 leaseholders.

The aim of this change was to improve the housing service by providing a more joined-up service, linking it to other Council services that residents rely on. We started this new era with openness and transparency so that our residents are aware of our challenges and what we are doing to overcome them. In this update you can find out more about the progress we have made.

Self-referral to the Regulator of Social Housing

Having reviewed housing services in the initial months of direct management, we established that although many of the homes we manage are in good condition, too many were not.

It was also clear that our repairs service is too often difficult to access, and many of our residents were not satisfied with the level of service they receive. We are determined to make improvements and tackle these issues, and as part of this process we decided to self-refer to the Regulator of Social Housing for a potential breach of its consumer standards.

We specifically asked the Regulator to examine whether we are providing decent homes, running an efficient repairs service, and completing fire safety actions within acceptable timescales.

The Regulator reached its conclusions and published a Regulatory Notice in March 2024, where it confirmed our concerns and detailed its findings, along with recommendations for which areas are most urgent to address.

We accepted the Regulator’s findings in full and began meeting with them monthly to provide updates on our progress. We will continue working with the Regulator until we have satisfied their concerns and the regulatory notice is lifted.

Progress update

We have already made significant progress in some areas, though there is still a lot of work to do before we achieve full compliance for our residents.

• We’ve increased the percentage of emergency repairs completed on time from 31% to 64%. We are working towards a target of 85%
• We’ve increased the percentage of on-time routine repairs from 56% to 81%. We are working towards a target of 90%
• We reduced phone waiting times for the repairs call centre from a 70-minute average to just 5 minutes in July 2024. That was back up to 19 minutes for September, but we will keep working to get it down again
• We’ve reduced overdue fire safety actions by more than half, meaning we are tackling the backlog as well as staying on top of new jobs ordered by our fire risk assessors. We still had 2,533 delayed jobs at the end of September 2024, though only 5 of these were in the most urgent category, and work was underway to complete them.

Complaints

When residents are let down by our service, they must have access to a complaints process which is fair and timely.

We have redesigned our complaints process in line with the Housing Ombudsman’s Complaints Handling Code, which sets out best practice for landlords, and implemented a robust system for recording and monitoring complaints.

Our improvement plan

We have identified specific tasks to make immediate and long-term impacts across the three areas raised by the Regulator: Repairs, Quality of homes, and Fire safety.

Repairs

• Reduce number of ‘work in progress’ repairs from 18,000 at self-referral to 3,000 by March 2025 (we have already reduced to around 7,000 in September 2024)
• Reduce the number of repairs managed by external contractors by June 2025. This will save on costs and enable us to have better oversight of work quality
• Reduce the amount of disrepair cases and costs associated by Jan 2025
• Reduce the time it takes us to refurbish and re-let vacant homes by June 2025
• Increase productivity of repair jobs by 30% by March 2025 through improved scheduling and oversight processes
• Reduce the amount of repeat and first-time damp and mould cases by 25% by March 2026

To achieve these points, our repairs service has commissioned an upgrade of its operation control system, consolidating six systems into one. This will deliver better scheduling and smoother data handling throughout the repairs process, whether work is undertaken by contractors or our in-house repairs team.

Quality of homes

• Complete a stock condition survey of 80% of our properties by December.
• Develop a long-term asset management strategy
• Establish a new 5-year capital investment programme in line with the findings of the stock condition survey
• Establish a target / timeline for bringing all homes into the Decent Homes Standard

We have been working to complete surveys of all the homes we manage since March 2024. At the end of September 2024, we had completed 9,424 home surveys, 70% of the total, alongside 1,439 block surveys, 91% of the total. The purpose of the survey is to check if our homes are safe and in good condition, and to help us plan maintenance programmes.

Our current position indicates that one in four (24%) of our properties falls below the decent homes standard. Damp and mould is our main issue for failing the ‘state of repair’ standard, with around 3,500 of our homes affected. We have allocated in the region of £320m over five years towards improving the homes we manage.

The survey is already enabling us to identify buildings prone to damp and mould, even where it hasn’t been reported, and plan refurbishment. We have recruited additional specialist damp and mould surveyors to work towards a target of performing a mould wash within 24 hours of it being reported by a resident.

Fire safety

• Complete the backlog of overdue fire risk assessment actions and stay within the agreed timeframes for new actions as they emerge.

We regularly check all our buildings for fire safety by conducting Fire Risk Assessments. Our high-rise buildings also have named Building Safety Managers who check for fire safety concerns at least once a month.

Fire risk assessors check a wide range of issues and make recommendations for improvements. These can range from whether appropriate fire doors are installed or if there any obstructions in hallways, to whether fire alarms are installed properly or if residents are keeping fire hazards such as scooters or barbecues in communal areas or balconies.

Each recommendation is given a priority rating depending on its urgency. If we fail to fix the issue in the given timeframe, it becomes an ‘overdue action’. 

Further in formation

What powers does the Housing Regulator have?

The objectives of the regulator are set out in the Housing and Regeneration Act 2008. It is empowered by Parliament to investigate social housing providers and enforce its decisions. Among the Regulator’s duties is to set consumer standards. It may take action if these standards are breached and there is a significant risk of serious detriment to social housing tenants. Read more about the Regulator of Social Housing.

I have had a bad experience with your service. How do I tell the Regulator?

The Regulator of Social Housing looks at the service as a whole and how it meets the standards set out by the government. Individual complaints should be made through our complaints process or the Housing Ombudsman. The Regulator works with the Ombudsman to get an overall picture of how we are performing.