PEOPLE
Strengthening customer voice
PEOPLE
Strengthening customer voice
People
Our People Corporate Plan priority is all about supporting our customers and colleagues to prosper and live well. This has involved improving our complaints process, listening to your views, and implementing our new People Strategy for colleagues.
Strengthening customer voice
Hearing customers’ voices and using your feedback to improve services has been a really high priority for us over the last couple of years.
In our Corporate Plan, we committed to:
Reviewing our Customer Voice Strategy and making sure customers influence our decision-making
Creating a Customer Experience Strategy
The next few sections on this page will show you how we made the customer voice count in 2023/24.
Listening to customers
complaints received
compliments received
customers consulted
TSM surveys completed
MP and Councillor enquiries addressed
Refreshing our Customer Voice framework
Building on our work last year, we made significant changes to our Customer Voice teams and structure. When we talked about our Customer Voice opportunities, some of you told us that the existing options didn’t work for everyone. In response, we:
Restructured our teams, separating complaints and customer voice into two distinct services.
Revamped our Customer Scrutiny Panel with new recruits, fresh training, and ongoing support. The Panel now focuses on issues that really matter to customers.
Started work on a new Customer Voice Strategy, to create a framework of options for you to get involved.
Delivering this strategy in 2024/25 will make sure we have the right customer input at all levels, with multiple ways to engage that suit different needs and preferences.
Measuring and using the TSMs
Over the past year, we’ve been collecting feedback through Tenant Satisfaction Measures (TSMs). This wealth of insight helps us understand what we’re doing well and where we can improve.
Like all housing associations, we’ve shared this data with the Regulator of Social Housing, and we published it on our website explaining what we are doing in 24/25 to improve customer satisfaction, adding updated results every 6 months so that you can see our progress.
Overall satisfaction with service provided
Relaunching the Customer Scrutiny Panel
Our Customer Scrutiny Panel (CSP) is crucial to our governance structure. They meet regularly to review our services, providing reports, constructive feedback, and evidence-based recommendations. This in-depth look makes sure we find customer-focused solutions and make positive changes where needed.
Their role is more important than ever as we begin to be assessed against the new Consumer Standards and Tenant Satisfaction Measures (TSMs).
The new panel has started with a review of our repairs service, a top priority for lots of customers, helping us shape our service to better meet your needs.
Meet the Chair, Slawomir
Slawomir Pawlik is the Chair of the Customer Scrutiny Panel. He’s been a One Manchester customer since 1996, he lives in Hulme, and works for the NHS. He joined because:
As customers, we want to influence decisions about our homes and living environment. Being part of this panel gives us the chance to shape One Manchester’s decisions.
I think the most important thing is independence of the panel. While we are part of the governance of the organisation, we are independent, so our views are not influenced by the executives or anybody else. So at the end of the day our recommendations will be our recommendations."
Understanding our customers
In 2023/24, we completed 4,886 Tenancy Experience Visits which have been key to understanding our customers and getting behind every door to see whether we can provide more tailored support to those who need it. We also used the data gathered at these visits and analysed this against complaints data to see whether there were trends. Finding these trends will help us to improve our service.
Listens and acts on tenants’ views
Keeps tenants informed
Holding more customer consultation events
We held over 60 customer consultation events in 2023/24 to gather your feedback on various topics. The largest theme was ‘The Big Listen’, focused on our repairs service.
‘The Big Listen’: Your thoughts on repairs
We’re thrilled that over 500 of you shared your thoughts through our various consultation channels. Whether you attended an event, completed an online survey, or joined our Big Listen Activity Day, your feedback has been invaluable.
The Big Listen helped us understand what’s working well and what needs improvement in our repairs service. Key themes you highlighted:
Reducing wait times
Improving the quality of completed repairs
Getting better at communication after repair bookings
With your feedback in mind, we’re now redesigning our repairs service to better meet your needs.
You Said, We Did: policies and strategies
Customer input has shaped several policies and strategies in 2023/24, including:
External Funding Strategy
Value for Money (VFM) Strategy
Customer Experience (CX) Strategy
Asset Management Strategy
Sustainability Strategy
Inclusive Access Strategy
With your feedback in mind, we’re now redesigning our repairs service to better meet your needs.
We also introduced 6-monthly ‘You Said, We’re Doing’ reports to show how your voice shapes our services and strategies.
A new Customer Voice Strategy
After doing all the background work in 2023/24, our Customer Voice Strategy was approved by Board in July 2024, ready to deliver in the coming years.
Thank you for your engagement in 2023/24, which made it one of our biggest and best years for hearing customer voices in a while.
We’re committed to keeping this conversation going and ensuring One Manchester works for you, every day.
Improving the service you receive when you complain
We value all feedback, especially when things don’t go as planned. We’re always eager to hear how we can do better, and use customer complaints as opportunities for us to learn and improve our services.
Over the past year, we’ve made lots of improvements to our complaints service. Guided by the new Housing Ombudsman’s complaints handling code, and your input, we introduced a new Complaints Policy and process designed to deliver a better experience for you.
Overall satisfaction with handling complaints
Treats tenants fairly and with respect
What’s changed
Clearer communication: We rewrote our complaint letters to provide clearer and more consistent information.
Dedicated support: A Customer Resoultion Officer (CRO) now makes a triage call with every customer who raises a complaint. This helps us fully understand the issue, identify any specific needs, and clarify the desired outcome.
Fairer compensation: Our approach to compensation has been updated to ensure fairness for all customers.
Increased visibility: We’ve expanded our efforts to promote our complaints service through online channels, community engagement, and Tenant Experience Visits (TEX).
Simplified process: We’ve removed unnecessary steps, such as requiring customers to justify escalating a complaint.
Behind the scenes
To support these improvements, we’ve invested in:
Enhanced training: Our teams have undergone comprehensive training to equip them with the skills to handle complaints effectively.
Increased resources: We’ve expanded our Customer Experience team and enlisted more managers to oversee complaints.
Improved oversight: We’ve strengthened our monitoring of live complaints and timeframes to ensure timely, quality responses.
Complaints: how are we doing?
complaints in 2023/24
complaints in 2022/23
There’s been an increase in the number of complaints received in 2023/24. This shows we’re more accessible as we’ve increased ways customers can complain. Over time we are aiming to improve our services and learn from the feedback in complaints to bring this number down.
Handling time: Stage 1 average handling time including extensions
2023/24
2022/23
Our average handling time for Stage 1 complaints has decreased a lot from 21.5 days in 2022/23 to 13 days in 2023/24. Although we’re making progress, we know that there’s still room for improvement.
Our target is to respond to 100% of Stage 1 complaints within 10 working days.
Complaints responded to within timescales
2023/24
2022/23
While our overall performance for responding to complaints within timescales was 75%, we improved lots throughout the year, as a result of the changes we made to the way we deliver the service here, ending 2023/24 with 97% complaints responded to within timescale for March.
complaints responded to within timescale March 2024
Satisfaction
We’re committed to increasing customer satisfaction with our complaints handling process. Our current satisfaction rating of 44.94% is below our target of 70%. We recognise that many respondents to our satisfaction survey haven’t experienced the formal complaints process.
Learning and improving using complaints
We’re dedicated to using your feedback to drive service improvements. Through looking at customers’ journeys, we find areas that need improving and share this information with relevant teams.
Some of the improvements made based on complaint feedback include:
A more proactive approach to no-access repairs
A new process for booking follow-up work
Post-inspection checks on subcontractor work
More contact with customers following Healthy Homes works
Enhanced emergency repairs process
Improved visibility and accessibility of Neighbourhood Officers
Collaborative estate inspections with colleagues and customers
Mandatory safeguarding training for all staff
For a more detailed run through of our complaints performance, check out our website.
customer journeys mapped