Delcam PS-Team's Programme and Performance Management Autumn seminars came to a successful close with over 100 delegates from 60 housing organisations having attended the events.
Delcam develops and implements the PS-Team Programme & Performance Management solution for Local Authorities, RSLs and ALMOs and provides free, educational seminars where major topics and issues are presented by expert speakers and discussed by the delegates.
The events, held in Leeds and Birmingham, presented the recent changes in housing inspection and showed the benefits of using existing programme data to produce performance reports. One of the main benefits is significant cost savings due to the elimination of the need for double entry of data as the information is collected at source as the work is being carried out. This also means that the information is ready and available when you need it and is delivered to the right people at the right time.
David Langhorne, Assets and Programme Manager for Your Homes Newcastle, presented a case study about the ALMO and how it is now using data from its Programme Management solution to automatically produce performance reports. YHN Your Homes Newcastle is not only maintaining its housing stock to the Decent Homes Standard as required by the Government but in addition is implementing a Modern Homes Programme, which includes Decent Homes Plus.
Your Homes Newcastle has already seen additional benefits from using PS-Team for Performance Management as well as Programme Management. These include:
Heads of Housing for the North and Central regions of the Audit Commission discussed the changes in regulation and inspection and what impact that has for organisations managing social housing in UK. Topics included the Cave review and changes in social housing regulation, the introduction of short notice inspections for poorly performing organisations, the new framework - CPA to CAA and Value For Money developments.
Documents surrounding these events, such as a White Paper on Programme and Performance Management and a summary of the presentations, can be requested from www.ps-team.com.
Homes for Sedgemoor
The housing management services delivered by Homes in Sedgemoor were judged 'poor' with 'uncertain prospects' for improvement by an inspection report published by the Audit Commission. The Commission inspection team gave the service a zero-star rating.
The report concludes that the service provides poor value for money. Its costs are high while key services such as repairs and maintenance are poor. The service is not always delivered in a customer-focused way and tenant satisfaction has declined.
The inspectors found some positive elements of service delivery, such as:
To help the service improve, inspectors made a number of recommendations. These include:
Homes in Sedgemoor is a not-for-profit arms-length company that manages and maintains Sedgemoor District Council's homes. It was formally set up from 1 April 2007 to manage approximately 4,200 homes.
Other LA Reports
Other local authority inspection reports issued by the Audit Commission during November included:
ARHAG Housing Association
The housing management services provided by ARHAG housing association are 'poor' but have 'promising' prospects for improvement, according to an inspection report by the Audit Commission. The Commission inspectors gave the service a zero-star rating.
The Association has had to focus on governance and management matters as a result of the previous inspection and the subsequent statutory inquiry, and this has meant that tenants are not yet seeing sustained service improvements.
The inspectors found:
The report concludes that ARHAG is self-aware and has taken a number of difficult decisions to address the serious governance and management issues identified in our last inspection and as a result of the statutory enquiry.
Other RSL Reports
Other registered social landlord inspection reports issued by the Audit Commission during November included:
