Getting Involved
- Do I have the right to be consulted about changes to my home or the services I receive?
- How else do you consult tenants for their views?
- Why involve customers?
- What is customer involvement?
- Who can become involved?
- How can customers become involved?
- How is our commitment to involve customers being implemented?
- How can we measure whether customer involvement is working?
- How can I find out more?
- Download a copy of our leaflet – Involving Customers
Do I have the right to be consulted about changes to my home or the services I receive?
You have the right to be consulted about any changes that would make a significant difference to the management or maintenance of your home.
We will advise you of our plans, ask for your views, listen to what you have told us and let you know what we are going to do before taking any action.
We will offer you information either by personal letter, a formal notice or as an item in the Newslink. Sometimes, we may arrange a meeting to give tenants an opportunity to discuss a particular issue in more detail. We will always consult with resident associations if their members are going to be affected by our proposals.
How else do you consult tenants for their views?
We carry out Tenant Satisfaction Surveys on a regular basis. Responses to the survey influence changes in the Trust's policies and procedures. As well as Tenant Satisfaction Surveys we also carry out less formal surveys about specific issues such as repairs satisfaction, customer involvement and new tenant/new properties surveys.
Why involve customers?
Our vision is “Social Responsibility and Business Excellence – Making a Positive Difference to People’s Lives”. We believe that by involving customers in our business we are working towards this vision by:
- continuing to improve our services through listening to what customers want
- providing better value for money
- being more accountable to customers
- increasing customer satisfaction and customer loyalty
- providing more choices for customers
- making a positive contribution to the communities where customers live
- achieving growth by building on our reputation for providing excellent services
- meeting the needs of other stakeholders such as local authorities and the Housing Corporation, our regulatory body
What is customer involvement?
Customer involvement covers a wide variety of opportunities for customers to:
- receive information about our services
- give their views on our business priorities, services, policies and management practices
- make decisions about services and priorities
To make customer involvement meaningful we are committed to providing clear information about our services and providing different opportunities for customers to become involved individually or as part of a group.
We are committed to making it as easy as possible to become involved in the Trust, for example by ensuring that meeting facilities are accessible to customers with disabilities. We are also committed to listening to what customers say and ensure that we respond to feedback that we are given.
Who can become involved?
We welcome involvement by everyone who is a tenant, leaseholder or applicant, including members of their family. We also provide opportunities for feedback from individual and corporate customers of services that we provide e.g. Astraline and others who have an interest in our business, such as local authorities.
How can I get involved?
We recognise that customers are individuals and therefore levels of interest in involvement and the ways in which people want to become involved will vary widely. It is therefore our aim to provide as many ways as possible to become involved. The different levels of involvement can be summarised as:
- being in control e.g. joining the Board
- getting involved e.g. attending a focus group with other customers, joining a customer involvement group; joining an email customer panel; setting up a residents’ association
- giving views e.g. in person or by telephone/email to staff, through the website; responding to surveys or consultation letters about policies and other matters
- staying informed e.g. through the ‘Newslink’ newsletter
How is our commitment to involve customers being implemented?
We aim to provide more opportunities for customers to become involved in future and will be publishing these widely.
To put our commitment to customer involvement into practice we are developing a 3 year action plan and will publish service standards for customer involvement. The action plan will be approved by the Board and will identify resources and include customer priorities raised.
We will involve and encourage our staff to develop customer involvement and will promote involvement through staff recruitment and performance management practices.
All Board reports will consider the implications for customer involvement.
How can we measure whether customer involvement is working?
There are a number of things we can do to ensure customer involvement is working:
- increased numbers of customers providing feedback
- increasing involvement from minority groups
- achievement of staff objectives and targets for customer involvement
- increased customer awareness of involvement and satisfaction with opportunities for involvement
- improved customer satisfaction with action taken following feedback on services
- positive feedback from customer panels and other tenant groups on the implementation of this policy
- improved customer satisfaction with services
- fewer customers leaving
Effective customer involvement requires resources. This is an investment if customer involvement leads to better services, but an unwelcome cost if it does not prove effective.
We will therefore critically examine the cost of involvement and weigh this against the benefits and impact of involvement. We will publish an annual report on customer involvement and the Board, committees for all our stakeholders.
How can I find out more?
If you would like to find out more about becoming involved, you can telephone our Customer Services Team on 0845 6041095 or you can email us at gettinginvolved@jjhousing.co.uk
Alternatively, you can write to:
Peter Daly
Director of Housing Services
“Johnnie” Johnson Housing Trust Ltd
Astra House
Spinners Lane
Poynton, Cheshire
SK12 1GA
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