Fix it
Resident voice
C9. What arrangements are in place to enable the residents to hold management to account for provision of services?
We strive to ensure that the voice of the customer is at the forefront of our plans and that our Executive Team and the board have access to up-to-date customer feedback and data. The growing role of our Customer Committee is a good example of how we are strengthening customer voice in our organisation. The Committee is made up of five board members and two involved customers (one chair and one vice chair). Their role is to analyse our complaints and assess any scrutiny reports which Karbon have conducted in a board-level forum.
We’re pleased to say that 76.6% of our customers feel that their views are listened to and acted upon. This is particularly important in areas such as building safety and sheltered housing. This year, we hosted and arranged 573 volunteer hours of resident involvement, up from 314 hours last year.
Customer safety
A key trend
Housemark identified having an ‘iron grip’ on customer safety as one the key trends for this year. As well as having stringent standards, the Grenfell tragedy in 2017 showed the world how important it is for housing associations to listen to customers – an imperative set out in the recent Building Safety Bill.
The Karbon Residents Committee took part in a Building Safety Scrutiny Review this year as part of their annual programme of scrutiny reviews. We invited the group to scrutinise a range of resources including our Building Safety Matrix which gives risk ratings and insight on all our 637 blocks (11 of which are over 18m high).
As well as giving us a clear picture of where to invest in fire safety work, the matrix helps us to pinpoint where tailored engagement strategies may be required for the specific needs of any higher risk residents or blocks. The Committee gave us feedback about the types of communications they thought Karbon should produce for residents in those locations, including tailored information pamphlets on fire safety which are currently being distributed.
Landlord health and safety has been a key theme of our Group Customer Committee making sure that customer voice is integrated with our formal governance structures. We will be adding a Safety Panel to our resident involvement framework in autumn 2023, following on from the guidance of the Building Safety Bill and its focus on resident involvement.
|
Resident involvement activity |
Total volunteer hours 22/23 |
|
Karbon Residents Committee |
60 |
|
Scrutiny panels |
75 |
|
Customer Environment Group |
17.5 |
|
Stanley Area Forum |
56 |
|
Chester le Street Area Forum |
52.5 |
|
Tyne Valley Area Forum |
24 |
|
Consett Area Forum |
8 |
|
Sheltered Housing North |
136 |
|
Sheltered Housing South |
144 |
|
Total |
573 |
Our resident involvement structure includes:
- The Karbon Residents Committee, our primary customer scrutiny group with 70 members.
- A Customer Committee made up of five board members and two involved customers. Their role is to analyse our complaints and assess our scrutiny reports in a board level forum.
- Area forums which provide local insight. First introduced in Stanley, they now include Chester le Street, Tyne Valley and Consett. These groups play a significant role in preventing anti-social behaviour and crime, allowing residents to air their concerns to local police who also attend. These groups also play a role in our placeshaping agenda.
- Sheltered housing groups which have been a huge success since their introduction as they enable residents to hold Karbon to account on issues such as service charges, communal facilities and shared outdoor spaces.
- Social media continues to play a huge role in resident engagement and corporate accountability with many residents using social media channels for complaints and observations. Across our three main media channels in 22/23, Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter, we had a social media reach of 1.2 million.
Customer Environment Group
We’re also bringing our customers on our Net Zero journey with our Customer Environment Group
This gives customers the chance to have their say on our approach to the environment and climate change, and ensure we are focusing on environmental issues affecting them.
Phil Thornton is a member of the Customer Environment Group and has really seen the benefits it can bring:
“It gives the chance for customers to be involved and have a voice so we can offer our thoughts on what organisations like Karbon can do. We have to move forward together in order to make change so the more you get involved, the better.”
Phil was also one of five Karbon customers sitting on the Social Housing Tenants’ Climate Jury. The Climate Jury is considered the first of its kind, set up by five housing associations including Karbon Homes. It gave customers the opportunity to get together and talk about environmental issues, recommendations they want to make to housing associations and how they can move forward.
The Climate Jury recently won an award at the Northern Housing Awards for Best Resident Involvement initiative.
C10. How does the housing provider measure resident satisfaction and how has resident satisfaction changed over the last three years?
|
Customer Net Promoter Score (NPS) 19/20: +45.5 20/21: +55.2 21/22: +49.9 22/23: +39.8 Target: +52.0 |
|
Overall satisfaction 19/20: 89.3% 20/21: 90.7% 21/22: 87.2% 22/23: 80.7% Target: 88% |
|
Average effort (lower is better) 19/20: 3.69 20/21: 3.24 21/22: 2.89 22/23: 3.40 Target: 2.9 |
|
Average trust 19/20: 8.44 20/21: 8.69 21/22: 8.57 22/23: 8.20 Target: 8.50 |
|
Right first-time 19/20: 84.54% 20/21: 87.35% 21/22: 87.22% 22/23: 88.40% Target: 88% |
|
% satisfied with quality of home (new homes): 19/20: 87.1% 20/21: 92.0% 21/22: 90.5% 22/23: 92.7% Target: 93% |
|
% satisfied with quality of home (all homes): 19/20: 92.1% 20/21: 92.6% 21/22: 87.9% 22/23: 87.9% Target: N/A |
|
Neighbourhood satisfaction 20/21: 90.9% 21/22: 87.0% 22/23: 87.0% Target: 90% |
The Institute of Customer Service (ICS), data and insight company Housemark and Acuity (Karbon’s research provider) have all reported a sustained decline in satisfaction scores across the sector recently. However, our NPS (Net Promoter Score) is currently at +39.8 which compares well to an average score across the service industry of +25.9, and the average housing association, which stands at 0 (neither a negative nor positive score).
One reason for our NPS remaining high may be the successful introduction of customer friendly digital customer service channels. Around 30% of incoming customer enquiries are now made online. In the financial year 22/23, enquiries which were fully automated, known as ‘true self-serve’, rose dramatically. The level of transactions in this category went from 11.3% in April 2022 to 15.2% by the end of Q1 2023.
Growth is partly due to the adoption of the MyKarbon customer portal, which now has 12,756 active users. That’s a 16% increase in the last year alone. The ability to pay rent via our automated telephone service has also had an impact with growth in telephone payments rising by 800-1000 users per month.
