27th April 2021
Liza Handley, Customer Relationship Manager, Civica discusses how capturing the right property data, alongside specific customer requirements allows local authorities to offer quality and sustainable homes that meet customers’ needs.
The amount of data created each year is growing faster than ever before. In 2020, people created 1.7 megabytes of information… each second! This increase in data creation is no different for social housing organisations, but is the data used to make the right decisions?
By engaging with your customers, it’s quite easy to find information about what’s important to them. They will tell you about their needs and accommodation requirements, from the size of property to where they would like to live. And those customers with particular needs will include specific requirements like adaptations and support. Local authorities want their residents to live in safe, affordable good quality homes and learning highlighted shows that timely adaptations can make a real difference to peoples wellbeing. This is especially important to those with underlying health conditions and older people.
When local authorities use this data as part of the allocations process, it helps to provide the ‘best match’ when offering customers suitable properties. Here’s four helpful tips:
1. Know your property. If a property has adaptations record them in your system, let your customers know about these special features. This enables customers to make informed decisions before they are offered a property, which in turn will reduce allocation costs
2. Single view of your data. Where data is held across multiple systems, make sure they talk to each other. Data communications across systems enables you to assess current needs faster and plan for future needs more effectively
3. Matchmaking. Identify customers with specific requirements and match them to the right property, with the appropriate adaptations. Prioritising those who need adaptations makes best use of your properties and saves useful resources and money
4. Communicate. Learn to market your properties better. Tell your customers about your new building development or you’re re-launching a scheme. It will help you achieve a quicker turn-around on allocations.
Learn more about our Housing needs software.