The council manages around 5,600 properties across the borough and this report aims to let tenants and leaseholders know how we have performed in the financial year, from April 1, 2021 to March 31, 2022.

During 2021/22 the housing revenue account spent a total of £16.1 million in delivering services to you. In addition to this we spent £1.8 million on improving your properties, £0.8 million of which went on the Decent Homes programme which saw the installation of new kitchens, bathrooms, heating etc. We spent £1.7 million acquiring new properties.

We hope you have noticed the improvements and we will continue to improve your homes in coming years. We will always welcome your feedback to help us improve our services and so if there are any problems, please let us know. We hope you find the annual report of interest. There’s a lot going on and quite often tenants are involved.

Landlord service general (cross-service)

What we did last year

  • We consulted all our existing tenants on a proposed new tenancy agreement
  • We started the process of procuring a contract to digitise all five and a half thousand of our tenants’ house files and create an electronic document management system to reduce our reliance on paper 
  • Got cabinet approval for a new tenancy policy to be implemented

What we are going to do

  • Investigate the creation of an online customer portal (including a mobile app) where a tenant can self-serve on a variety of tenancy-related matters, such as viewing their rent account and setting up a direct debit; 

Customer engagement

Customers are at the heart of everything we do and we try to ensure that there are opportunities to have your say and get involved in a way which suits you.

We have a dedicated customer engagement team to support tenants and leaseholders in involvement opportunities including the Charnwood Housing Residents’ Forum, Senior Citizens’ Forum, Leaseholders’ Forum, Housing Management Advisory Board, focus groups, editorial panel and a readers’ panel.

Fortunately, during the past year we were able to resume our full engagement activities after the lifting of government restrictions in respect of the coronavirus pandemic.

What we did last year

  • We resumed our annual tenants gardening competition
  • We recruited successfully to the vacant customer engagement officer post
  • We developed a new three-year customer engagement strategy to be launched in April 2022
  • We worked with our editorial panel to agree a design and print format for the new tenancy agreement
  • We worked with our editorial panel to produce a new moving-in pack presentation folder for new tenants.

What we are going to do

  • Deliver on our proposed actions in the new customer engagement strategy
  • Recruit more members to our residents’ forum
  • Recruit more tenant inspectors to help us monitor the communal cleaning contract
  • Organise roadshows in different areas to and engage tenants in new ways
  • Develop a tenant training programme.

Investment in and improving tenants’ homes

Investing in our council properties to make them decent places to live is a key priority. This team delivers planned improvements such as new kitchens, bathrooms, heating, doors and external work such as roofing, fascia’s and soffits to name but a few.

What we did last year

Last year 114 homes received capital improvements works including roof replacements, structural works, heating and bathroom replacements.

What we are going to do

The 21-22 programme was interrupted when the capital works contractor ended earlier than originally planned.  

We have and continue to procure contracts to deliver our capital programme which will prioritise any back log from 2021/22.

Repairs

Our busy repairs team continues to provide across-team working between void and responsive work streams. This is how we performed last year against the targets we set:

What we did last year

% Responsive repairs which are completed ‘right first time'

Target = 96.00%
Actual performance = 99.82%

% Tenants satisfied with responsive repair

Target = 97.40%
Actual performance = 98.12%

% Tenants satisfied with time taken to carry out responsive repair

Target = 97.60%
Actual performance = 98.47%

% Emergency repairs completed within 24 hours

Target = 100%
Actual performance = 99.71%

Urgent repairs completed within five days

Target = 97.00%
Actual performance = 92.26%

% Tenants satisfied that operative arrived on time

Target = 98.60%
Actual performance = 99.76%

Average number of days taken to carry out re-let repairs standard voids

Target = 14
Actual performance = 20.38

What we will continue to do

  • Put our customer at the heart at everything we do;
  • Maintain an excellent service;
  • Strive to deliver our key performance indicators within the target ranges.

Gas service and maintenance

To keep our tenants safe and warm we work with our contractor, PH Jones, to ensure all gas appliances in our properties are working properly.

What we did last year

  • We completed landlord gas safety checks in 5,162 properties as part of a rolling programme to ensure our gas appliances are safe to use and well maintained
  • We completed 2,917 repairs with 83% within priority to maintain the gas central heating systems in our properties to expected standards
  • We replaced 47 boilers with modern efficient eco-friendly models. 

What we’re planning to do this year 

  • We will continue to provide annual safety checks to ensure gas appliances in our properties are safe to use. We will also work with our contractor to ensure repairs are carried out in a timely fashion to provide the best possible service for our tenants
  • Boiler and central heating upgrades and replacements are planned for approximately 300 domesticproperties in the remainder of this current year.

Tenancy support and financial inclusion

We offer advice and help to tenants to help them maximise their income.  We support vulnerable tenants to maintain their tenancies and to reduce the risk of eviction and homelessness.

What we did last year

  • In total 1,112 tenants were helped by tenancy support and financial inclusion officers
  • 254 tenants were helped with housing benefit applications
  • 122 tenants were helped to claim discretionary housing payments
  • We helped 168 tenants to get help through charity applications
  • We  assisted seven  tenants who were having difficulties maintaining acceptable and safe home conditions
  • We helped 68 tenants to claim and maintain universal credit claims
  • We dealt with 46 safeguarding concerns about children and vulnerable adults
  • We supported homeless households  moving into temporary accommodation in Charnwood properties including with benefits, utilities and furniture
  • We provided support, advice and assistance to tenants whose income and welfare had been adversely affected by Covid-19.

We will continue to

  • support and advise tenants moving to universal credit through natural and managed migration in order to maximise income to the council and  help tenants ensure that they can pay their rent and that there is no risk to their tenancies
  • assist and advise new tenants to claim housing benefit or universal credit
  • help vulnerable new tenants set up their tenancies by assisting to set up gas and electricity accounts and access essential items of furniture
  • advise and support tenants through the current cost of living crisis by helping them to gain access to all the financial, debt and health advice assistance that is available.

Anti-social behaviour (ASB) services

What we did last year

  • 1,601 ASB cases were recorded
  • We dealt with 97.11 % of cases using non-legal interventions (this relates to cases where we could progress the case);
  • We referred eight cases to mediation
  •  We implemented the new ways of working from the ASB review including the new approach to risk assessment
  • 100% of ASB complainants would be willing to report ASB again in the future which exceeds the target of 91.5%
  • We reviewed the structure and split the function of the housing services team leader role so there is a team leader responsible solely for the ASB services.

What we’re planning to do this year

  • Anti-social behaviour officers will attend the drop-in session attached to the estate walks
  • We will review the landlord services anti-social behaviour procedures
  • We will continue to work with partners to ensure that we use the most appropriate tools to deal with anti-social behaviour.

Income management

The teams of income officers and financial inclusion officers give advice and support to maximise income for tenants, helping them to pay their rent and avoid accumulating arrears.

What we did last year

  • The income management team collected 96.46% of the rent due from current tenants in 2021/22, including arrears brought forward. This exceeded our target of 95.70% by 0.76 percentage points
  • The total rent collected in 2021/22 for all tenancies was £20,997,235.71
  • We continued to develop the excellent working relationships with our colleagues in the Department for Work and Pensions (‘DWP’) to ensure we assist our tenants to claim universal credit
  • Following the introduction of any-day direct debits, there was an increase in direct debit payers. At the end of 2020/21, we had 2,260 tenants who paid via direct debit. At the end of 2021/22, there were 2,434 tenants. This is an increase of 174 more tenants than the previous financial year who have elected to pay their rent either weekly on any day, fortnightly, four-weekly or monthly
  • We made available for tenants to set up a direct debit for their rent via the council’s website
  • In September 2021, we procured a new home contents insurance contract where the average reduction in premiums for tenants and leaseholders, equates to approximately 30%.

What we’re planning to do this year

  • We will adapt our rent accounting computer system to improve our rent arrears escalation approach so more automation of the arrears recovery process to takes place to enable income officers to work more efficiently
  • We will look at alternative solutions to enable texting tenants regarding their rent accounts to enable wider and more immediate reach
  • We will continue to promote the any-day direct debit option to maximise income and assist tenants to make the payment on the day their income is received to reduce arrears
  • We will review the current income procedures.
  • We will continue to support tenants to maintain their universal credit claim to ensure they receive their housing costs to prevent or reduce rent arrears.

Tenancy and estate management

What we did last year

  • We received 63 mutual exchange applications. Of these applications 26 tenants moved to new accommodation through a mutual exchange
  • We contacted 96.43% of new tenants within four weeks of their tenancy commencing which exceeds the 95% target
  • We continued to carry out communal area fire safety inspections, visiting every one of our 283 communal areas and 21 sheltered schemes every month
  • We continued to monitor the performance of the new communal cleaning service to our general needs blocks of flats
  • We produced a pets policy, which was approved by cabinet
  • We revised our secure and introductory tenancy agreement and consulted existing tenants over our proposals during the autumn
  • We created a new tenancy and estate management team leader post and recruited to this post.

What we’re planning to do this year

  • Carry out five estate walks in 2022 and feedback the outcomes from the walk to tenants who attend the walk and publish outcomes in Your Homes Matter
  • Review and amend the procedure guide used by tenancy and estate management officers regarding requests for permission for pets
  • Review and amend the procedure guide to ensure our procedures match the requirements of the new tenancy agreement
  • Working in partnership with our customer engagement team, we will be recruiting residents to carry out independent cleaning inspections in our communal areas.

Leaseholders

What we did last year

  • We completed our creation of a section 20 consultation register (this relates to our legal obligations to consult leaseholders when we’re planning to spend over certain financial limits)
  • We created a five-year plan, to include planned maintenance
  • We continued to re-invest in leasehold property investment services
  • We carried out fire risk assessments to shops and blocks
  • We maintained the leasehold service throughout the pandemic and lockdown
  • We collected 92% of all leasehold service charges raised

What we’re planning to do this year

  • We will continue to implement new communal door entry systems, replacement shed doors, roof replacements and emergency lighting installations
  • We will continue evolving our five-year plan
  • We will reinstate the Leaseholders’ Forum and surgeries in person
  • We will attend conferences and training events to enable to keep ourselves updated with changes leasehold law and good practice
  • We will develop further electronic communication of certified summaries and estimates to leaseholders as a preferred channel of communication
  • We will offer leaseholders the option of having a new fire-compliant front door installed by us (chargeable) as part of our wider programme to replace tenants’ front doors where we have to.

Warden services and Lifeline

This team supports our elderly and vulnerable tenants and gives them and their families peace of mind through an on-call warden and emergency response service. 

What we did last year – we dealt with

  • A total number of calls of 71,949 of which 93.7% were answered within 30 seconds and 97.5% were answered within 60 seconds
  • 666 calls due to customers falling
  • 701 calls to the ambulance service
  • 183 medical emergencies
  • 126 medical requests
  • 257 calls to wish customer ‘Happy Birthday’
  • 120 out-of-hours warden calls.

What we’re planning to do this year

  • We will continue our work towards upgrading our alarm equipment in all of our sheltered schemes to ensure they are ready for the digital transformation

Where we spent money

During 2021/22 the housing revenue account (‘HRA’) spent a total of £16.1 million in delivering our services to you. In addition to this we spent £1.8 million on improving your properties, £0.8 million of which went on the Decent Homes programme which saw the installation of new kitchens, bathrooms, heating etc.

Capital spend (improvements to properties e.g. new kitchens, fire safety measures, adaptations) totalled £3.5m.

The £16.1 million HRA service costs are broken down as follows:

  • Repairs and maintenance/ planned and day to day maintenance - £6,169k
  • Supervision and management - £6,393k
  • Rents, rates, taxes and other charges - £749k
  • Debt management costs/ Bad debts - £106k
  • Interest paid - £2,699k

Last updated: Wed 31st August, 2022 @ 10:51