The Social Housing Sector Needs to Change Its Mindset Towards Repairs and Maintenance

In recent years, the housing sector has seen many new technologies and innovations launched to help improve relationships between housing providers and residents.?

But I believe that many housing organisations aren’t getting value from these solutions because some still prioritise short-term costs over longer term benefits to the resident. As a result, they don’t employ effective enough strategies to realise the full potential of these new tools.?

I believe that social housing providers need cultural change if they are going to improve resident satisfaction. They need to stop focusing on the initial cost of repairs and instead focus on the “whole life cost”.

I feel that a change in culture and mindset is essential if housing providers are to really make a step change, boost customer satisfaction and save money in the long run.

Buy Cheap, Buy Twice

Have you ever heard the old saying “buy cheap, buy twice”? You go out and buy the cheapest washing machine you can find, and no surprise, it lasts half as long as a decent one.?

Before you know it, you’re washing your clothes in the sink and wasting your time and money calling in repair people or buying a new one.?

The saying also applies to repairs in the social housing sector. If you base your repairs procurement decisions on price alone, then issues are going to resurface more quickly and more often, which is only going to damage resident satisfaction and ultimately cost you more.

But in the social housing sector, it’s not the person making the procurement decision who suffers. It’s the resident and their family.

Resident satisfaction in the social housing sector continues to fall year-on-year and complaints over the quality of housing are higher than ever. So you’d imagine that housing providers would prioritise quality and resident satisfaction. And in fairness, the good ones do.?

But some housing providers still prioritise cost over the quality and type of repairs they carry out.?

The reality for Housing providers is that due to short-term budget constraints, they walk themselves into a false economy

Driving down costs this way costs them more in the long term and degrades the resident experience.?

Let me explain why:

Poor-quality work and fixing symptoms rather than the root cause

As I mentioned above, in general, you get what you pay for. I believe that you cannot expect to get good-quality work if you put pressure on contractors to drive down costs beyond what is reasonable.?

And if you don’t get good-quality work, there’s a greater chance that a repair will fail or is not fit for purpose. If this happens, you may need to send someone back out again.

Focus on short term cost means that in most cases the symptoms of issues are dealt with over and over, rather than resolving the root? cause of the issues just once.

Not completing jobs the first time leads to endless list management. This is similar to the problems facing the NHS, which has to commit a huge amount of budget to manage its appointments and operations lists rather than actually resolving issues.

Nothing will change without change

A good digital platform isn't just about scheduling repairs. Take EVO, for example; we provide an end-to-end digital system that improves communication between residents, landlords and tradespeople.?

We make the repairs and maintenance process more efficient using a combination of automation, big data and high-quality repairs.

The benefits of a system like this include:

• Better communication with residents
• Complete transparency and accountability
• Full job history, including images and videos of issues and work carried out
• Details of all parts and materials that have been used or replaced
• Enriched property information to improve longer-term decision making
• A warranty so that you have complete peace of mind and do not need to engage directly with tradespeople

It’s also far more efficient. For example, we don’t waste time and resources gathering quotes. Instead, we have an agreed rate card with all contractors and clients. This reduces delays.?

But if housing providers continue to prioritise cost and choose the lowest quotes received, they may not see any improvement in resident satisfaction and happiness.?

Unhappy residents

Most housing providers want to improve residents' happiness. Choosing the cheapest quote often means repairs don’t last as long as they should, or they just deal with the symptom of an underlying issue. This can lead to callbacks and further problems.?

This does not help these organisations in their goal of improving resident satisfaction.

The EVO way of managing repairs and maintenance is to ensure the root cause of the problem is resolved.?

Of course, we believe that landlords should pay a fair price - but we don’t think they should just focus on finding the cheapest short-term solution.?

The EVO way is designed to provide a first-time, long-term solution that resolves the underlying cause and leads to a one-time fix. This keeps the resident happier and leads to a lower whole-life cost for the housing provider.?

If a resident feels as though they are listened to when they have issues and there is prompt action taken then they are more likely to treat the property like their home. This leads to a better-looked-after property, which in turn leads to shorter void periods between tenancies and lower repair bills.

Cultural Change Means Focusing on Whole-Life Cost

I believe housing organisations are stuck in a negative cycle of short-term thinking: poor repairs end up costing them more money in the long run, which puts pressure on their budgets and encourages them to drive down costs, which makes the quality and suitability of repairs even worse. This leads to even more repairs.?

What’s needed is cultural change. They should be asking themselves:

• How can we improve resident satisfaction?
• Can we implement a long-term strategy that reduces overall repair events?
• How can we rebuild resident trust?
• How can we reduce void periods?
• How can our staff be more efficient?

Not:

• How can we reduce operating expenditure in the next 12 months?
• How can we stay within the repairs and maintenance budget?

So how can cultural change be achieved while also staying within tight budgets?

Firstly, housing providers should ensure their staff can work more efficiently:

• Start automating job bookings and other simple tasks
• Store all property information and job history in one place
• Use big data to aid decision-making

This will reduce the amount of time housing providers spend on admin. It also ensures jobs are completed more efficiently, preventing extensive work-in-progress lists from building up. This saves housing providers even more time and frees up resources.?

This involves investing more in systems and processes to ensure more repairs are completed first time and to a good standard. This will lead to fewer repairs in the long run.?

More importantly, it ensures that residents get good-quality homes and an excellent resident experience.?

How EVO Enables Cultural Change

When we created EVO, we started by identifying the problems that were causing poor resident satisfaction, namely:

• Poor communication
• Long repair lead times
• Poor-quality short term repairs
• Too many reoccurring issues
• Tradespeople having to make multiple visits

We built our platform around solving these problems.?

But we also think that landlords shouldn’t pay over the odds. That’s why we agree on reasonable prices with our tradespeople up front. This also saves landlords time and resources because they don’t need to waste time gathering quotes.

All our work is guaranteed, so if a repair does fail you don’t end up paying for it twice. Our customers can save up to 30% on their operating expenditure by switching to the EVO way.?

Plus, residents are happier, more likely to trust you, and more likely to look after their home. They might even begin to make their own repairs, saving you even more money.

Drop me a message, and I’d be happy to explain how our award-winning service can benefit your housing organisation.