Customer Scrutiny Panel ANNUAL REPORT
Who we are We are a key part of how Stockport Homes is governed and how it meets its obligations to give tenants and customers a role in scrutinising and reviewing how the company performs and how services can be improved. This is known as ‘co-regulation’. The Customer Scrutiny Panel (CSP) is an award-winning body, accredited by TPAS. This Annual Report provides an update on the activities of the Customer Scrutiny Panel covering the period April 2021-March 2022.
Who are the members We currently have 6 members
We come from across the Borough including the Town Centre, Hillgate, Brinnington, Cheadle, and Woodley and we all have an interest in helping our landlord improve its services which ultimately benefits all customers from across Stockport. Following the challenges of the pandemic, we are delighted to be fully back up and running again and are looking for more customers to join us. We aren’t looking for any specific skills or experience, training and support will be available to anybody who joins. More information on the Panel and what is involved is available on our CSP pages at www.stockporthomes.org/customer-scrutiny-panel I have been a member of the CS Panel for almost 4 years. I have found my previous experience in housing and customer service from a work view point, has enabled me to be an effective member of the team and to understand better comments made by customers in their responses to surveys. Bob McGechan I joined the panel over a year ago. In that time I have become aware of some of the challenges Stockport Homes faces and the excellent work done to meet them. The panel aims at keeping everything customer friendly. Derek Morgan I am now in my sixth year of being a Scrutiny Panel member, looking at improving services and communication between SHG and their tenants. On a personal level, being part of this team has improved my confidence and given me purpose and seeing how our work has helped others makes me feel very proud of our hardworking panel. Pamela Hunter I am Shared Ownership tenant with Stockport Homes and so I think it gives me a unique view on the services provided by Stockport Homes to their tenants, which is a really positive thing for the group. Stephen Whitbread
I enjoy being on the scrutiny panel , because as a member of the team, we can scrutinise how SHG are working with customers and making policies and procedures better for them to understand. Derek Atherton Being a member of the Customer Scrutiny Panel has given me the opportunities that lets me see “behind the scenes” of what Stockport Homes wants to do to make their customers able to live in their homes knowing they are receiving the best care. It’s not all work and no play....it’s been an interesting time for me over the years. Pat Rapley
Support for the CSP We receive support from an Independent Mentor, Jayne Boote, who assists us when we carry out reviews, making sure we are able to ask the right questions, get the right information, to have the greatest impact. Jayne has many years’ experience working with tenant scrutiny groups and we really appreciate her support. Quote from Jayne ‘Stockport Homes have always had a commitment that the CSP should have independent support to enable them to undertake effective scrutiny. This commitment has enabled us to work with the CSP so that they choose and scope topics for review, select appropriate scrutiny methods and produce a report independently of Stockport Homes. Our role is to equip the CSP with the tools they need to undertake effective scrutinise.’ The Governance and Scrutiny Team at Stockport Homes support us with the arrangements for the Panel.
Covid-19 Just like in 2020-21, Covid-19 had a significant impact on our work as it prevented us from meeting in person for large parts of the year. However, because we are provided with tablet devices from Stockport Homes, we were able to continue with our work and keep everyone safe by meeting virtually over Zoom. In February 2022, we restarted our meetings in person again at Stockport Homes’ head office, Cornerstone.
Our aim The biggest part of our work is carrying out Service Reviews. This is where we take a detailed look at services and how customers experience those services. Where it’s needed, we will make recommendations about where we think Stockport Homes should consider making changes or improvements. Some of these will have positive short-term results for customers, others might take longer to lead to changes to how services are delivered. Once we have completed a Service Review, our report is given to the Service Manager to enable the service to formulate an action plan on how they intend to respond to our recommendations and provide us with a timescale on implementation. We see this part of the process as vital in developing our relationship with the service and allowing us to monitor the changes made. We then report our findings and recommendations directly to the Board of Stockport Homes and the Service Manager is able to inform the Board of the action plan. Each review provides a great learning process for both the Panel members and for staff at Stockport Homes, and the scrutiny process evolves with each review.
Every year, the CSP aim to complete at least two reviews of Stockport Homes’ services and over the last year, we’ve been able to surpass that, by completing three service reviews! The services we reviewed are: • One Number Service • Customer Safety Team • Homechoice Service
The difference we make Our first review of the year was the One Number Service. The One Number Service is the first point of contact with Stockport Homes for all customers. It was updated in Autumn 2019 after its initial implementation in 2017, with the aim of improving the customer experience by enabling customers to access a wider range of information and support at the first point of contact. As this is a vital service for many customers, we wanted to review its effectiveness. We have found that overall, One Number is an effective, responsive service that resolves many enquiries at the first point of contact. However, we felt that some areas of the service could be improved; these include providing a general enquiries option on the telephone menu, promoting webchat, improving customer communication when enquiries are referred to other departments and increasing the number of satisfaction surveys undertaken. Overall since the review, the customer experience has improved for those who call the One Number. Martin Saunders, Head of Customer Access said; ‘The CSP review was very useful and practical for the One Number team. Following the recommendations we have changed a number of things, including the wording on the telephone system to make it more understandable for customers and due to this, we can see there has been a reduction in the number of customers that need to be transferred to another number.’
The difference we make Our second review of the year was the Customer Safety Team, who ensure that Stockport Homes’ customers receive their annual gas safety check and an electrical test every five years. In order to ensure that every customer receives their service check the Customer Safety Team have in place a process of letters and text messages to arrange appointments. As all customers receive this service, we felt that undertaking a review would be of benefit to customers and Stockport Homes.
We found that whilst the current letters are sufficient in ensuring gas and electrical checks are undertaken, they have not been reviewed for some time. We felt that the letters would benefit from being re-written in a new format to ensure that the key actions that customers need to take stand out and to make clear the benefits the checks provide. Since the review the letters have been simplified which will make it a lot easier for customers to engage with the service when they are required to have a gas or electrical safety test.
The difference we make Our third and final review of the year was the Homechoice Service, who customers engage with to apply for a home at Stockport Homes. Because most residents of Stockport Homes have at some point used this service, we felt that it made sense for us to assess how easy it was to apply for a home and how effectively applicants expectations of the service are managed. We found that overall the Homechoice service is good and applicants can easily apply for a property and clear information is available on how to bid for a property. We did however find that that improvements could be made regarding communication between the service and applicants. We hope that our recommendations of improvements to the service will help customer who use the service.
We’ve also been • reviewing how we decide on what reviews to do so that they are based on what we know tenants care about and will be able to improve their experience • reviewing how we do our work to make sure that we’re getting the right information and checking the right things • reviewing how we can involve other customers in the process so that we can draw on their experiences, • making sure we’re keeping up with changes in how Stockport Homes works • working to improve our communications with other tenants about what we do and the impact its having We plan to make some changes and improvements in the next 12 months to make us even more effective and to make sure customers are kept informed of our work and achievements.
Representing Tenants Nationally
TPAS National Scrutiny Week 2021
The TPAS National Scrutiny Week took place in Autumn 2021 and provided a chance for tenants and social landlords to celebrate the impact of working in partnership to scrutinise services. TPAS are a national not-for-profit organisation who support and promote tenant involvement and empowerment in social housing. Two of our group, Bob McGechan and Pamela Hunter did just that by delivering a live virtual presentation explaining how tenant scrutiny is approached at Stockport Homes, including some case studies from recent reviews. Again, another opportunity to strengthen Stockport Homes’ national reputation for tenant scrutiny. Did you know that all Stockport Homes’ tenants and residents can access Tpas membership for free? For more information about Tpas and the benefits of being a member visit www.tpas.org.uk What else we’ve done
Customer Monitoring Group
Over the last year, we have taken up the role of the Customer Monitoring Group, which meets three times per year. The role of the group is to monitor performance and other various projects across Stockport Homes and provide feedback to the Council’s Member Committee, which is a meeting between Stockport Homes and Councillors. This is a valuable way for us to engage with Stockport Council so that we can give our views on how Stockport Homes are performing.
Annual Away Day
In November 2021 we were able to meet in person for our annual away day for the first time since before the pandemic began. We were pleased to get together and plan for the next 12 months. We usually get together a couple of times per year to celebrate our achievements and have some fun.
Review of letters
In December 2021 we carried out a short responsive review of a sample of general letters that Stockport Homes send to tenants relating to various matters. We set out the principles of what we thought should and should not be included in standard letters, to ensure that letters are as customer friendly as possible and clear and easy to understand. Those principles have been shared across Stockport Homes and will be more frequently applied to letters.
Tenant Satisfaction Measures
In January 2022, we were consulted on a new set of measures being proposed by The Regulator of Social Housing called Tenant Satisfaction Measures. Before Stockport Homes responded to the consultation, we were consulted to provide feedback and views on their effectiveness, as the intention is, that the measures are used by tenants to understand the performance of social housing providers. This is another example of our ability to help positively represent customers at a corporate and national level.
What we’re doing next
In the next year, we will be reviewing another two or three service areas that we think would benefit from our input. We will also be working with our Independent Mentor and Stockport Homes’ officers to explore how we can get even more out of scrutiny, by working in new ways and making sure that the voice and experience of customers is central to how we choose our reviews and the recommendations we make. Over the next year we hope to use new ways to highlight our work to other customers, making more effective use of social media, and improving how we present our findings to the Board at Stockport Homes. We’re always keen to welcome more customers to get involved in our work, either as members of the Panel or in reviews about services that affect them, their families and communities. You could make a difference by becoming the next Panel member!
Conclusion We’re all really proud to be able to work with Stockport Homes to improve the services and experiences of our fellow customers, and grateful for the support of staff at Stockport Homes for helping us in that work. To find out more about what we do and the impact tenant scrutiny has visit www.stockporthomes.org/csp You can even make suggestions about areas we might look at. If you’re interested in getting more involved in what we do and making a difference, contact 0161 218 1666 or governance@stockporthomes.org