Agenda item

Report of the Head of Housing

The Strategic Director of Housing and Customer Services presented the report to Members and highlighted the headline results of the survey.  Although satisfaction levels had improved in the majority of areas since the survey was last conducted in 2015, improvements were still required regarding communication as well completing repairs first time.  There would also be focus on the complaints process and a plan has been put into place to deal with the issues with car parking.

Councillor S Sheahan was pleased that benchmarking analysis was going to be undertaken and was very interested in the results.

In response to a question from Councillor S Sheahan, the Director of Housing and Customer Services gave reassurances that he would be actively acting on the results of the survey to make further improvements.  Councillor S Sheahan was not convinced as it was hard to tell if the service was improving overall as Members no longer received the full picture, he asked if the service was improving.  The Strategic Director of Housing and Customer Services responded that the service was improving and the results of survey proved that.  He added that the service was regularly monitored and there was various tenant panels which reported to Cabinet.  However, results of some previous benchmarking has shown that the service was in the lower quartile of landlords, so he was aware that there was still improvements to be made.

Councillor N Clarke was pleased to see the increase in satisfaction levels but was concerned about a number of areas.  In particular ‘Council listening to views and acts upon them’, which had improved only slightly and was at 54 percent, he hoped the proposed improvements to Customer Services as referred to in the previous agenda item would have an impact. 

Councillor N Clarke commented on the low result regarding how anti-social behaviour was dealt with as this was often raised during his casework and was an important issue.

Councillor N Smith commented that anti-social behaviour was the responsibility of the Police Service and in hid experience, it was not always taken seriously.  The Chairman explained that tenants had conditions within their tenancy regarding anti-social behaviour and he believed this was what the survey questions were based on. 

Councillor N Clarke raised concerns that only 84 percent of those surveyed were happy with their homes, considering the amount of money that had been invested in the Decent homes Programme he would have expected that figure to be higher.

Councillor N Clarke was pleased that focus was being placed on completing repairs first time.  In relation to the decrease in satisfaction for getting hold of the right person, he referred to comments made by the Chief Executive at a previous Council meeting regarding empowering officers and hoped this would help in the future.

The Chairman commented that he would like to see a customer survey undertaken on the District as a whole which could be delivered along with the annual council tax letter. 

Councillor T Eynon asked for some further details on how the poor perception of the complaints handling was being addressed.  The Strategic Director of Housing and Customer Services explained that the Tenant Scrutiny Panel had been investigating the complaints process for the last six months and a report would be considered by Cabinet in March containing all of their findings and recommendations which would be put into practice.  He reported that the main issue was with repairs maintenance and improvements had already been seen in response to actions already put in place to complete more jobs first time.   He also added that there was a dedicated officer to oversee the complaints and further monitoring to ensure any follow up work took place.

By affirmation of the meeting it was

RESOLVED THAT:

The report be noted.