Annual
Report
Stockport Homes
2015 - 2016
Welcome
& how we
perform
2-3
Board and
scrutiny
Working
together
Customer
finance
A greener
Stockport
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5
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Contents
Welcome
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From Helen McHale, Chief Executive and
David Wright, Chair of the Board.
The last 12 months have seen many changes
at Stockport Homes, and we are both proud
to have been Chair and Chief Executive
during this time. We have been recognised
as a “Sunday Times top 100 company” for
the 7th consecutive year, along with being
recognised nationally as an innovative
organisation, and voted as the second best
landlord in the country for the second year
running.
The Board saw some changes; with former
Chair, Roger Phillips leaving during his 9th
year, and it has been a privilege for David
to take over, and continue to develop the
close and constructive relationship between
the Board and staff, that is central to the
approach and culture of Stockport Homes.
This year we have celebrated many
achievements including agreeing a new 27
year management agreement with Stockport
Council which allows for future plans to
unfold and getting the go ahead for our
new head office to be built. Team Stockport
Homes continue to be hardworking and
dedicated to transforming the lives of our
customers and delivering high performance
during difficult economic times.
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Team
Stockport
Homes
We are realistic about the challenges to our
business posed by the policy and financial
changes from central Government but we
will adapt and adjust to ensure we remain
in a position to deliver our core services,
continuing to innovate and influence at the
same time. Supporting our most vulnerable
customers will remain a key priority.
Over the next 12 months we will be focusing
on growth and development, allowing us
to flourish and continue to deliver services
that mean we are much more than just a
landlord.
Helen McHale Chief Executive
Stockport Homes - Annual Report 2015 - 2016
David Wright
Chair of the Board
www.stockporthomes.org
Your
Building for Getting you Safe and
community the future
online
sustainable
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Money
matters
Our awards
12 13-14 15
Customer Involvement with
this report:
Thank you for giving us your feedback on the information you wanted to see in this year’s
annual report, along with how it should look.
We know that how we are performing as your landlord is very important to you and we
compare our performance with other similar organisations where we can. You told us that the
areas where you were most interested in seeing how we perform are:
Anti-Social Behaviour (ASB)
98% of customers are satisfied with the outcome of their ASB case.
Repairs
99.6% of repairs are completed right the first time.
Gas safety
Repairs
The national
average is
90.75%
100% of the homes we manage have a gas safety certificate.
Rent
0.87% of the homes we manage have rent arrears.
Estate visits
Rent
The national
average is
2.82%
96% of estate visits receiving a rating of at least ‘Good’.
The re-let time for homes
An average of
9.8 days.
Adaptations to homes
We completed
The re-let time
for homes
The national
average is
26.42days
369 home adaptations.
www.stockporthomes.org
Stockport Homes - Annual Report 2015 - 2016
3
Board and Customer
Scrutiny Panel
The Board of Directors make sure that we are heading in the right direction as an organisation
and that we continue to transform lives. This year a new management agreement was signed
with the Council, to keep us as your landlord until 2041 – meaning we can put long-term plans
into place and build upon the achievements we have made over the last 10 years.
In October 2015 the Customer Scrutiny Panel was named
the ‘Most Inspiring Scrutiny Panel’ in the Arm’s Length
Management Organisation category at the Customer
Scrutiny Inspection (CSI) awards.
The panel reviewed our website to help us develop a
new one. This went live in February 2016 and means
that you will now find it much easier to access
information on your tablet and phone.
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Stockport Homes - Annual Report 2015 - 2016
www.stockporthomes.org
Working Together
Across Stockport, a range of partners offer
information, advice and support – by working
together we are able to share resources and
help more people with advice and support.
During 2015 / 16 we became involved in
three new partnerships:
‘Stockport Targeted
Prevention Alliance’
(TPA) providing a one
stop shop for local
people who need a range
of services, from information
through to intensive support.
WIN
The ‘Wellbeing and Independence
Network’ which provides practical
help to adults who would
otherwise find it very
difficult to organise the
support they need to remain
independent and well.
The ‘Alliance for Positive
Relationships’, which works
with people in fear of
domestic abuse as
well as those
experiencing
relationship
difficulties.
Stockport Alliance
for Positive Relationships
www.stockporthomes.org
Stockport Homes - Annual Report 2015 - 2016
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Financial help for
customers
Our Money Advice Team
provided advice to over 2,984
customers - helping to gain
over £4 million in additional
income for customers.
Through this advice we also
prevented 47 customers from
becoming homeless.
We supported 135 households to swap
homes to better meet their needs. This is a
27% increase on last year.
We supported 23 tenants with Welfare
Benefit Appeals, and 16 of these have been
successful.
We helped over 400 customers with their
Universal Credit claims, to make sure that
they get the correct payments. Where
necessary we helped prevent customers
from falling into arrears by arranging for
their housing costs to be
paid directly to us.
Helping Stockport
to be greener
We continue to invest in renewable
technology, helping our customers to
manage their energy bills as well as creating
a greener and cleaner Stockport.
In partnership with ‘Empower Communities’
we fitted 321 additional homes with solar
panels. Each of these homes is likely to save
around £158 on electricity per year.
£10,780 worth
of Total Warm
Homes Discounts
for 76 families
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We held over 100
garden and activity
sessions for customers
to learn new skills around
what to plant and grow at home.
Our team of Energy Solutions Advisors
have been providing advice to customers leading to:
£1,926 worth of
‘Charis Grants’ to
help families in
financial hardship
Stockport Homes - Annual Report 2015 - 2016
568 home visits to
support to switch energy
suppliers and apply for
grants totalling £23,366
www.stockporthomes.org
Delivering the best services by
being a great place to work
We raised £20,000 for The Christie
during the year through fundraising
activities, doubling the initial
target of £10,000! The Christie is a
national cancer specialist based in
Manchester and they were delighted
with this donation.
We celebrated being named a
Top 100 employer for the seventh
successive year! This shows that our
team has strong values and principles, that
managers talk openly and honestly with their staff
and that we continue to have a strong social
conscience, as a company.
We have held our accreditation from Investors in People since it
was launched, and we are proud to have achieved this again this
year. We are ‘gold’ standard showing our strong commitment to
developing our staff.
We encourage staff to use up to four hours a month to
volunteer for local projects or organisations that help
the community and our customers. Rob Lloyd, our
Performance Manager, helps out at our Pantries
every month.
“I am glad to have the chance to support this
great project in Stockport that really helps our
customers to get affordable and healthy food.”
www.stockporthomes.org
Stockport Homes - Annual Report 2015 - 2016
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In your
community
Digital roadshow
We spoke to 830 customers during our summer ‘Digital
Roadshow’ about how the internet is used and how we could
provide help and support to get more people online. This resulted
in 672 people going on to get more support for employment, join
youth projects and get training.
Funding
We helped 34 local groups to make bids for funding – which
has provided £353,858 worth of grants for groups including
‘Click in the Community’ and the Oak Tree Court residents
association.
Over 50s events
During the year we arranged
181 events for the ‘over 50 and
fabulous’, this helped 2,212
customers and local residents to
learn new skills, get fit and meet new
friends.
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Stockport Homes - Annual Report 2015 - 2016
www.stockporthomes.org
Community buildings
We manage 10 community buildings on behalf of Stockport
Council, which can be booked for meetings and events, local
clubs and birthday parties. This year has seen usage go from
strength to strength and during the year income has gone up
by 21% creating additional income to help deliver frontline
services.
Skills for Life
We delivered over 104 Skills for Life courses for over 500
customers. 99% of people attending rated the course as ‘good
or excellent’.
We delivered a further 27 courses as part of ‘SK1lls for
Stockport’, which 183 local people attended.
Three months after attending a course we ask customers about
what’s happened since:
• 30% of people were carrying on with further or higher education
• 45% of people were doing voluntary or paid employment
• 91% of attendees said the course improved their overall wellbeing
• 45% of attendees said the training had helped them to get more
involved in their community
Young people and families
44 local families, including 69 children, joined us for the
Holiday Kitchen project and a further 150 young people
came to a range of activities during the school holidays,
such as Adswood Cookery School, a football event and
Walnut Tree Vikings.
We held 28 community clean up days including 7
‘Clean for the Queen’ events to help keep Stockport
tidy.
We also provided funding of £50,000 to 52 community
and residents groups through the Community Fund.
www.stockporthomes.org
Stockport Homes - Annual Report 2015 - 2016
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Building for
the future
The need and demand for good quality, affordable
housing has never been so high and we are proud to
be building new homes in Stockport. During the year
we completed 43 homes for shared ownership and 12
for rent and began work on a further 67 homes for shared
ownership and 75 for rent.
We invest in the training and development of our team. During
the year 25 operatives became ‘multi-skilled,’ meaning that
we can often complete a job sooner and not have
to arrange a separate visit for another trade. This
has contributed to on going savings, which
will be invested into other projects to keep
improving the services we offer.
repairs
completed
during 2015/16
33,935
Investment
We invested over £12 million in homes across
Stockport, on projects such as roofing, new kitchens and
bathrooms and heating systems.
Private lettings
We offer a reliable lettings and
management service to private
landlords, meaning we have
been able to provide
housing for an additional
38 families this year.
We currently
manage 93
private
properties
across
Stockport.
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Stockport Homes - Annual Report 2015 - 2016
www.stockporthomes.org
Getting you
online #digital
New website
Your feedback on our website helped us to launch a
brand new one in February. The new site makes it easier to
find the information you need and works
much better on tablets and mobiles.
Digital Heroes
We worked with 258 customers to train and inspire them to
share skills and digital know how with other local people, to
help more customers get online.
Free Wi-Fi in
Brinnington tower blocks
200 households in three Brinnington tower blocks can now access free Wi-Fi , and can come to
weekly training and family friendly school holiday sessions through the on-site training facility
‘SK1Pad’.
Click in the
Community
Over the last 12 months we have provided training
to over 40 people aged 40 and over, the ‘clickers’
completed a huge 565 learner hours at York Street as
part of ‘Click in the Community’.
www.stockporthomes.org
Stockport Homes - Annual Report 2015 - 2016
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Safer and sustainable
communities
Adaptations
We completed 162 major home adaptations for 139 tenants and 226
major adaptations for 181 private customers. We helped a further
99 disabled customers with advice and support through our ‘Staying
Put Scheme’ about how they could adapt their home.
Carecall
We responded to 204,554 emergency calls, and
supported 7,969 customers across Stockport. We completed
2,034 visits to help people following a fall, and 5,000 general welfare visits.
Area teams
£400,000 has been invested into completing improvement projects, including:
improved recycling facilities, fencing and gate upgrades to increase security; and
transforming communal areas to make them more pleasant and usable.
Anti-Social Behaviour (ASB)
We were the first service in Greater Manchester to secure an injunction under the new ASB,
Crime and Policing Act during 2015. This year:
• We resolved 98.31% of cases in an average of 63 days
• 98.02% of customers were satisfied with the outcome of their case
• 98.45% of customers were satisfied with how well we kept them informed on progress
• 98% of customers were satisfied with how the case was handled
• We served community protection notices for untidy gardens, and two people
have since been prosecuted
• We secured 166 injunctions to stop ASB
• We issued five closure orders with one resulting in outright
mandatory possession of the property
The Positive Engagement Team dealt with 58 cases and their
involvement meant legal action was avoided in 41 cases, saving
£52,362 in court costs and legal fees.
Winter Welfare
We completed 203 ‘winter welfare’ visits to
customers who need some extra support.
These visits took place in the run up to
Christmas, so that we could also help people
who may have been lonely or isolated.
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We completed
home visits with 3,329
customers as part of our
scheduled programme to offer support and
carry out property inspections.
Stockport Homes - Annual Report 2015 - 2016
www.stockporthomes.org
Money matters
We are proud of the projects and services that we deliver to make sure we keep ‘transforming
lives’, but we often need extra money to do this which cannot come from rental income alone.
We therefore work hard to bring in additional funds by offering commercial services to other
organisations – this money is used to offer you the best services possible.
The two charts below show where the money we receive from rent and service charge income
is then spent:
92 pence rents
Where each £1
comes from that is
spent on services
6 pence service charges
and other income
2 pence commission
from collecting water
charges on behalf of
United Utilities
56 pence day-to-day management
and maintenance of your homes
23 pence major repairs
17 pence interest and loan payments
2 pence water rates paid to
United Utilities
How each £1 is
spent on services
2 pence kept for future investment
www.stockporthomes.org
Stockport Homes - Annual Report 2015 - 2016
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Providing a value for
money service
£200,000
We are committed to making savings wherever we can, to make sure you
are getting value for money if you rent with us or use our services. In the
last year we met out ‘annual efficiency target’ by taking measures such as:
Renegotiating the price we pay for IT services, saving us £79,000
Reducing the amount we spend on using contractors to do repair work for us,
saving £200,000
Reducing court costs through tackling the root causes of anti-social behaviour
via our Positive Engagement Officers has saved £52,362
Taking over the running of some Community Centres and managing them more
effectively has saved over £30,000
Changing some of the processes in the way we recruit people has saved £18,000
Bringing our Carecall and Concierge teams together, allowing for the provision
of more services saved us £22,000
Handling insurance claims made against us in-house saved £5,000
£79,000
Changing the way our grounds maintenance contracts works, saved £38,000
Changing our arrangements for postage saved us £8,000
£52,362
£38,000
£30,000
£18,000
£22,000
£5,000
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Stockport Homes - Annual Report 2015 - 2016
£8,000
www.stockporthomes.org
Our awards and
accreditations for
the past year
Winners of
Best cleaning and
Facilities Management Team
Winners of
Excellence in
Youth Engagement
Winners of
The most Inspiring Customer
Scrutiny Panel
Winner of
Social Landlord
of the Year (Large)
Winner of
Public sector skills
for business award
Best Companies Top 100
for the seventh consecutive year
Winners of
“Helping Tenants Manage the
Impact of Welfare Reform” award
Outstanding Approach to
Managing Your Income Award
Accreditation:
Customer Service Excellence
www.stockporthomes.org
Stockport Homes - Annual Report 2015 - 2016
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Accessing
our services
We would like your
feedback on this
report – please
contact us at
marketing@
stockporthomes.org
The annual report is a summary of what we have
done this year. If you would like a copy in large print,
Braille, on audiotape or CD, please contact the Social
Inclusion Team on
0161 474 2860, email
[email protected], or text 07891 949 399.
If you’d rather receive this Annual Report by email in future, contact
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Stockport Homes - Annual Report 2015 - 2016
[email protected]
www.stockporthomes.org