06 August 2024
Summary:Annual Residents’ Report published and “encouraging” Tenant Satisfaction Measures announced.
We have published our 2023/24 Residents’ Report, highlighting areas and activities over the past year which residents have told us they want to know more about including organisational spend, resident satisfaction, and cost-of-living support. Highlights in the report include:
Customer Engagement and Voice Framework
One of our top priorities continues to be listening and working closely with residents to make the right improvements to our services. Our Customer Voice Framework, developed with residents in 2022, ensures meaningful involvement in decision-making. Over the past year, residents influenced the recruitment of our new CEO and Executive Director of Property and helped shape responses to government consultations on damp and mould.
Customer Satisfaction and Surveys
Repair services remain a top priority for us and residents. We have invested in new systems to enhance maintenance response times. Improvements include streamlined repair reporting via MTVH Online and a new training program for repair operatives. Resident satisfaction with planned works rose from 79% in April 2023 to 83% in March 2024, and satisfaction with repairs increased from 71% to 72% in the same period.
Support During Cost-of-Living Crisis
MTVH significantly increased its Tenant Welfare Fund to £729,000, aiding 3,675 residents. Advisory services helped residents secure over £3 million in financial support, addressing essential needs such as rent, food, and heating.
Community Projects and Well-Being
Collaborating with local partners, MTVH delivered initiatives like Good Grub Cafe and youth violence prevention projects to enhance community well-being and safety. A partnership with Age UK in Barnet provided vital support to vulnerable older residents at the West Hendon estate. These are examples of how we are working to manage neighbourhoods responsibly, invest in our resident communities and provide care and support to those who need it most.
Our inaugural Tenant Satisfaction Measures
We are pleased to present our first ever set of Tenant Satisfaction Measures (TSM). This is the first year that the Regulator for Social Housing (RSH) has required all housing associations to report a consistent set of TSMs to enhance transparency for residents and to allow associations to identify areas of strength, and where improvement can be made.
It is encouraging that 68.3% of our tenants are satisfied with MTVH’s homes and services overall, and over 75% say that we treat them fairly and with respect. We have compared our results with organisations of similar size and complexity and are pleased to see that we are a top performing organisation across many of the Tenant Satisfaction Measures.
However, we acknowledge there is room for improvement and work to be done particularly around our homeowners. This year, we formed a new Service Charge Collaboration Group featuring a diverse mix of shared owners and leaseholders from across all MTVH regions. The group meets quarterly to help enhance communication and transparency around service charges, enabling homeowners to influence and be involved in the decision-making processes affecting them.
Youth Engagement and Future Housing
Our Community Impact team are proactively working on a wide range of initiatives to help empower young residents’ and ensure their voices are heard and can positively impact the future housing decisions affecting them. Over the last year, we initiated a collaboration with Active Communities Network (ACN) to train young people from Clapham Park in Youth Work.
In January, a group of MTVH Young Connectors began a 12-week programme to learn how to engage effectively with their peers, address social issues and promote positive change on the estate. Recognising that more needs to be done to engage young people in decisions about housing and following on from our 2022 report ‘Housing Futures: The vital role of home in young people’s futures‘, we developed a partnership with two other G15 housing associations as well as the Partnership for Young London, to help build the youth voice, share learning across the housing sector and influence future policy together.
Geeta Nanda, MTVH CEO, stated: “MTVH’s vision is that everyone should have a decent home and the chance to live well. Collaborating with our residents brings many benefits and helps us direct help and support where it is needed most. We have consistently heard over the past year that the cost-of-living crisis is a huge pressure on households, and we have responded in several ways to provide support for residents in areas where they need it most. We are committed to working hard for every resident every day to deliver good and consistent customer service and create wider opportunities for them”. Read the full resident’s report here.