Aster and Synergy Customer Scrutiny Panel
-Review of Mutual Exchanges
Final for discussion with Dave Ball
17th December 2013
1.Introduction
1.1Who we are
The Customer Scrutiny Panel (CSP) is made up of 8 members. Our role is to scrutinise the performance of Aster Groups services as an independent and separate function within the Group governance structure acting on behalf of all the groups’ customers. We consider ourselves as a positive critical friend assessing the service areas selected by ourselves from the information supplied by the Aster Group.
The CSP agrees what areas of Aster Groups customer facing frontline services it wishes to scrutinise and is provided with the information it requires, in order to gain a detailed view of how Aster Group performs in that area.
The CSP’s role and duties also includes the following:
- Shaping housing, community and other related services
- Monitoring housing, community and other related services,
- Reviewing housing, community and other related services
- Scrutinising housing, community and other related services
The CSP accept and follow the guidelines and principles set out in the CSP Terms of Reference and feel it is important that we maintain links and ensure effective communications with the Group Leadership Team, Housing Leadership Team and Customer Boards and the various customer groups. We take seriously our role in ensuring decisions made by the leadership team meet residents’ reasonable expectations.
The CSP agrees what areas of Aster Groups services it wishes to scrutinise and is provided by Aster with the information it requires in order to gain a detailed view of how Aster Group performs in the specific area being scrutinised.
1.2Why we are involved in Scrutiny
Changes in regulation from April 2012, requires Aster Group to work together with residents to set, monitor and enforce standards. This regulatory framework is called ‘co-regulation’ and aims to move the focus of decision-making and performance management for housing services away from the housing regulator towards residents and the landlord to agree locally defined needs and priorities.
Aster Group aims to give residents more responsibility to hold the group to account in the way services are shaped and delivered by continuous improvement and shaping services and by keeping the customer at the heart of everything the Aster Group does.
The individual members of the CSP care passionately about their homes, and the service that customers receive and that’s why they give up their time to volunteer on this group. They want Aster to be the best across the sector, and are willing to go the extra mile to ensure this happens.
We want to be a voice for Aster Group customers comprehensively reviewing individual service areas and making recommendations for service improvements which will deliver value for money for the customers and group and always aim to give a balanced view of an area.
1.3Why we chose the Mutual Exchange service
The CSP are in their infancy, and this being our first review, we discussed which area we should review both amongst ourselves as a panel and with representatives of the Customer Involvement Team. A panel member suggested Mutual Exchanges due to the impact that Welfare Reform and the “Bedroom Tax” is going to have both on the company and its customers, this was with a view to how to promote the Mutual Exchange service. An effective Mutual Exchange system is integral to providing quality customer service; the scrutiny will help to measure customer satisfaction and will be a useful source of information and feedback for improving services. Often customers are the first to identify when things are not working properly.
A good system can be an economical and efficient way of improving an organisations public image and increasing customer satisfaction. It can also enable organisations to review their own performance and identify, address and learn from common or reoccurring issues and service-related problems.
1.4 Initial Presentation by Dave Ball, Service Manager responsible for Mutual Exchanges
Prior to starting the review, the CSP received a full presentation from Dave Ball, the Service Manager, setting out all aspects of mutual exchanges. Dave had received a brief and a list of information the CSP required which had been drawn up as part of a desk top review of the service. This helped us to scope our work and frame the service review
2.What we looked at and who we spoke to
2.1Our approach
We reviewed a comprehensive list of documents and performance indicators used by Aster Group. The following documents were reviewed:
Mutual Exchange Folders and leaflets
Policy Documents
Letters issued to Customers
Inspection Reports
Homeswapper Website
Aster Group Website –
Other relevant documents provided after interviews with staff
Good practice from other organisations
We had discussions with a number of staff over 2 full days in small groups of 3, who were part of the mutual exchange process, or who supported customers in their new accommodation.
The CSP commissioned a staff survey on mutual exchanges. The CSP compiled a list of staff which these surveys were to go to. The survey form and covering letter were agreed with the Group Chief Executive. Thiswas forwarded to local managers who decided, without the CSP who would complete the survey and sent it out. Only 35 returns were achieved from 5 offices, which was disappointing.
The CSP commissioned the market researchers to speak to residents (we contacted over 70 people and spoke to 26) who had undertaken a mutual exchange. We also visited a customer mid-exchange, attended a 6 weekly review of an exchange, attended a sign up and reviewed 2 files.
The CSP compared Aster Group with another registered housing provider – Green Square.
The CSP would like to acknowledge that we received co-operation from the staff and customers we contacted and would like to thank them for their time and support, in helping us to complete this scrutiny exercise.
2.2Data Protection
There have been occasions during this scrutiny exercise where the CSP were informed late in our processes that information cannot be provided due to Data Protection.
Information was also redacted so much it has made it impossible to use and the views which customer might have made to fellow customers were lost, or files were impossible to read as staff names and dates were removed, so we were unable to review whether promised processes were followed.
Much time was wasted and our volunteer work on this scrutiny had to be completed for a 2nd time where misunderstandings occurred.
In future the CSP would like Aster to consider requested information earlier and where a request is denied due to Data Protection reasons these should be fully explained and inform the CSP which section of either the act or the Data Protection Policy this might breach.
We look forward to working with Andre to understand and clarify these issues.
3.Headline Recommendations
The CSP have picked out here some of the issues from our perspective which will make the biggest difference for customer service and value for money.
The report in section fourcontains details of the strengths and recommendations for improvement in more detail, which we found during this service review.
Section five, includes some good practice from other organisations which we liked.
Here are our headline recommendations:
a)There is an inconsistency in approach between and withinAster and Synergy offices and on mutual exchange processes. Amalgamation of processes and procedures is suggested, which would give clarity for staff and customers and enable the adoption of the best working practices. The policy and procedures should be refreshed to take on the recommendations in this report.
b)The Group communication on mutual exchanges should be reviewed. The leaflets need to be reduced and refreshed as they hold different information and just one leaflet should be made available which includes details on homeswapper and timelines and useful FAQs. This should include support and the detail of what will happen and when in the process and what is expected from the applicants. This includes a revised application form which gathers more data which can be gathered before the sign up to improve the quality of that process. The FAQsshould state what support is available to move, like furniture schemes and financial advice and make clear that tenants moving into flats might also have to pay quite high service charges for lifts, gardening and cleaning. The CSP would be pleased to support staff to develop better communication for customers.
c)The standard of property and the form to capture the condition of repairs which is also shared with customers requires improvement. There is confusion on literature and use of this and there isinconsistent staff training. Some staff follow procedures, others take instruction from their manager. It is not clear whether a lettable or a mutual exchange standard is to be met. The CSP feel the void standard should be met. The repairs form shared with tenants is not in plain English and excludes parts of the building like lofts and roof spaces.
d)Performance management of exchanges needs to improve. There are few performance indicators captured or shared on exchanges. Staff develop ideas of where log jams occur and the problems they face, but they have no data to review (it is collected on a spread sheet, not on computer and no PIs are produced). Staff do not know how they perform within the Group and no data is captured on exchanges which do not proceed, despite the cost to the company. There is no proactive benchmarking or sharing of data with other landlords for services to improve.
e)There should be more discussion amongst staff on the exchange process. Exchanges should be discussed and shared through staff focus groups and the Group should adopt some of the good ideas and practices that have developed or have been reintroduced by offices or individual officers, since the last procedural review. New forms or checklists which are useful, should be shared with the heads of service or peer group. Formal staff training for consistency of process for customers and other staff teams involved in the process is necessary.
f)The Group should be more proactive and support tenants in arrears to downsize through mutual exchanges. Customers in arrears due to the bedroom tax are unable to access the hardship fund and are not informed of it. Staff do not know circumstances where the fund could be used, so only £2k has been spent. Tenants need help to move to prevent arrears rising where they have a spare bedroom. The hardship fund should support this (as well as currently supporting older people to downsize) on the agreement that former tenancy arrears will be paid off weekly until the account is clear. All staff should be made aware of the Hardship Fund and understand the criteria for use and how they can flag up cases where they would benefit from access to the fund.
g)Staff should be proactive in refreshing waiting lists for mutual exchanges for those who no longer wish to move and in searching for matches for applicants to support those who need help to move quickly.
h)Staff should be proactive and check on tenants on the exchange list with rising arrears. Tenants who have £1000 arrears are not allowed to access the list, but those with £999 are. No check is made if those arrears go up, to remove or freeze the application. This leads to abortive and expensive failed exchanges and gives false hope to match customers.
i)The CSP advocate that Aster should move customers with rent arrears of £500 and under only, unless tenantsare unable to pay due to Welfare Reform. Customers will also be struggling with paying bills (heating etc) in bigger houses. If they are unable to move with rent arrears then they have no way of getting out of the situation. There could be a clause in their tenancy agreement as part of the Mutual Exchange that says that the applicants have to pay former arrears at £5 or £10 per week as part of their new tenancy agreement. By doing this, the CSP feel more exchanges would take place and we would utilise our stock more efficiently than ever before. Aster could also prevent the debt rising further.
j)Many staff spoke to us about serial movers which cost the Group a lot of money. No performance data was available to back this up and the group does not know the cost of abortive exchanges, but it was consistently raised as an issue. The CSP would like Aster to investigate whether this is true, by capturing this data and if so, what can be done to charge applicants who move more than annually. Costs of exchanges for gas and electric checks as well as staff time of Neighbourhood Officers and Technical Officers are precious and expensive and should be estimated and reported.
k)The CSP feel that the managers approval is given too early in the process and should be considered later, when the exchange is more certain. Managers approve exchanges at the outset, but do not re-approve the final exchange. This is left to the Officer when there are complications, which have arisen on quality of repair and arrears of rent.
l)The CSP would like the Group to introduce a 2 tier approval system in which technical checks are only completed, when arrears are cleared and it is clear the move will take place. The CSP would also like Aster to investigate if deposits can be taken which are repaid if the exchange goes ahead or can be drawn upon by Aster to pay for abortive work. We would also like Aster to investigate the legalities of charging those who are serial movers for the costs to Aster.
m)The CSP would like the group to review whether signing and data sharing could be completed far earlier in the process, at the outset and not rushed in the one hour sign up. The Market Researchers and our own interaction with residents who had completed or were completing an exchange, suggested that the paperwork was complicated, not in plain English and included duplication and much was completed at the last minute. The CSP also ask that the group obtain the required personal information on benefits and rents ahead of the joint sign up and discuss this in private with the individual part of the sign up process.
n)The CSP would like to support Aster to improve the satisfaction form and to ensure it is sent to all parties, regardless of whether the move goes ahead and those who move to other landlords. The satisfaction questionairre is only sent to those who move to an Aster property. It is not completed by tenants who move out of the group, or those who abort during the process. The CSP would like Aster to offer incentives for returns of questionnaires and to design the information capture to enable lessons to be learnt to improve the service.
o)The CSP spoke to customers and completed file review and are not convinced that Aster is meeting the 42 day statutory deadline. The CSP suggest that timelines are developed for individual team tasks in repairs and in neighbourhoods and that file checks might be completed or white board introduced to all offices, to ensure deadlines start when an application is received and conclude at the sign up and this becomes a PI to measure staff performance.
p)The CSP would like to see constant reminders to exchange applicants that they should view the home more than once and understand that they should look carefully at the condition of their potential new home. The CSP feel it is inevitable that some repairs might be hidden by outgoing tenants and so we suggest these repairs should be reported within a deadline of 10 working days of occupation and the technical team should guarantee a visit to assess whether the repair might be possible.
q)The CSP would like Aster to investigate the legality of sharing information on local drug and sexual offenders with potential new tenants, so that this factor can be considered prior to the move and new tenants and their children can be protected. There is confusion amongst staff and managers on the rules on moving tenants who are ASB perpetrators. Training and consistency is required.
r)The CSP feel that the Group should investigate the potential for a specialist and proactive role for some staff on Mutual exchanges, due to the complexities of the process; the need to be proactive to support those who need to move due to the bedroom tax and to ensure procedures and quality standards and timelines of services to customers are consistent and met.
s)Finally, the CSP would like Aster to deliver our other more detailed recommendations in this report in section four and to consider some of the solutions and good practice we found outlined in section five when considering how to improve and deliver services which customers value.