Over 1,200 Residents Sign Up for Sovereign's Online Portal
Posted 10.01.13
Two months after its launch, more than 1,200 people have registered with Sovereign Housing Association's new online residents' portal. By early January, 1,280 residents had signed up for MySovereign, where they can pay their rent, report repairs and check their tenancy information.
Debbie Humm, Head of Sovereign Connect said:
"The number of people who have registered has far exceeded our target. The feedback we have received so far has been very positive - residents appreciate the fact that all they need to know about their tenancy can be found in one place.
"Based on the feedback, we are going to make further improvements to MySovereign to make it an even better online service."
In October 2011, the various subsidiaries in the Sovereign Housing Group merged to form a single legal entity, Sovereign Housing Association. The MySovereign project is aimed at standardising the customer experience across all of the Association's regions and giving residents more choice about how they access services.
Sovereign, which owns or manages over 35,000 homes across Berkshire, Devon, Dorset, Hampshire, Oxfordshire and the West of England, currently receives over 230,000 phone calls, 18,000 e-mails and 17,000 written letters a year from residents, as well as huge amount of face-to-face contact.
Sovereign aims to get 30 per cent of its contact with residents resolved via the self-service portal by April 2014, with MySovereign complementing, rather than replacing, existing ways of engaging with customers.
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Guinness Northern Counties Achieves HouseMark's ASB Accreditation
Posted 11.01.13
Guinness Northern Counties has achieved national recognition for its approach to tackling antisocial behaviour (ASB), after being formally accredited by performance and improvement champions HouseMark.
The 26,000 home social landlord was assessed against all 7 commitments and 44 building blocks of the Respect-ASB Charter for Housing, developed jointly by HouseMark and the Social Landlords Crime and Nuisance Group (SLCNG).
The announcement has earned Guinness Northern Counties a place in an elite group of around 1% of housing providers to have achieved the accreditation since it was launched three years ago.
HouseMark's Assistant Director, Gez Kinsella, said:
"The assessment process is rigorous in the way it scrutinises an organisation's strategic and operational approach to tackling ASB in its communities.
"It involves interviews with a range of internal and external stakeholders, including board members, managers and officers, residents and partner organisations such as the Police.
"Our assessment team found that Guinness Northern Counties provides a good ASB service to its customers, with high levels of commitment to tackling ASB. It reported that the organisation works effectively with local agencies to tackle and resolve ASB, is open to change and committed to improvement."
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Hyde Acquires 581 New Homes as A2Dominion Transfers Gosport Properties
Posted 14.01.13
The Hyde Group has acquired 581 properties in the Gosport area of Hampshire from the neighbouring A2Dominion Group. The transfer includes a mixture of leasehold, social rent and shared ownership homes.
Steve White, Chief Executive at Hyde said:
"We're delighted with the acquisition of these homes, which complements our existing stock and supports the expansion of our operations in the Hampshire area.
"This stock transfer will enable us to welcome new residents to the Hyde family, providing them with the very best in housing services, while at the same time supporting Hyde's ambition to continue to grow as a business."
Nicholas Yeeles, A2Dominion's Executive Director (Commercial, London), said:
"This latest transfer marks the completion of the first phase of our stock rationalisation programme, which has involved more than 2,300 homes being transferred or swapped during 2012 to eight recipient housing associations across London, the South East and Cambridgeshire.
"The aim of our rationalisation programme is to deliver more locally-based services to residents and ensure efficient and cost-effective management of our homes."
Both organisations have worked with the residents in Gosport to ensure that they would experience a 'seamless transition'.
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Derwent Living Expands Portfolio With 111 Properties
Posted 16.01.13
Derwent Living has taken over the ownership and management of 111 properties from leading provider of integrated housing services Metropolitan - in a transfer sale of more than £6 million.
Nottingham-based Metropolitan has transferred 51 of its social rented homes in the Derbyshire Dales district and 60 in Bolsover to Derby-based housing provider Derwent Living.
The properties transferred to Derwent Living on 14 January, bringing its total number of properties to more than 15,100.
The sale follows on from a landmark £45 million deal achieved by Derwent Living in 2011 which saw the transfer of 1,144 social properties from Home Group, which was rationalising stock outside its key area in the north east.
Good Housing Improves Health and Saves Thousands in Care Costs
Posted 11.01.13
Providing an Alternative Pathway, released by the NHF, takes an in-depth look at how people's lives have changed when housing associations and their support workers are involved in aftercare decisions with councils and local hospitals.
The report concludes that integrating housing with health and social care can improve the lives of vulnerable and older people and save thousands of pounds in health and care costs.
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New Welfare Reform Research Published
Posted
The Federation's work to ensure that the voice of social housing is central to the debate surrounding Welfare Reform took another large step forward today with the publication of the first research report from Ipsos Mori and Cambridge University.
