Why Tenant Satisfaction Measures And Total Asset Management Go Together
One way to look at the Government’s proposed Tenant Satisfaction Measures (TSM) is as an exercise in managing surveys and publishing data. This is missing an essential point.
Efficient information gathering will certainly be indispensable. Draft TSM standards were published in December and there’s a clear expectation that all social housing providers must collect and publish standardised annual reports showing their performance against the proposed tenant satisfaction measures. Transparency and openness are the watchwords.
The Regulator of Social Housing expects that: ‘registered providers must ensure that the information is an accurate, reliable, valid, and transparent reflection of their performance against the tenant satisfaction measures.’
But there’s a bigger issue about what story the TSM reports will tell. This is about how social housing providers can influence the narrative and protect their reputations.
Looking Back or Looking Forward?
An annual survey report will tell you what happened. It will tell you how resident customers felt about the service they have received and the standard of their homes. But the events that shape their judgements will be in the past. By definition, the events and the impressions they caused can’t be changed.
TSM reporting will come on top of new building safety regulations and existing habitable homes standards. This level of public accountability will make it essential for social housing providers to get on top of stock condition data and move to proactive asset management.
Fragmented service delivery and disjointed compliance data collection make the task of improving standards and reporting on performance even harder. Addressing these issues will become an urgent priority for many social housing providers in 2022.
Proactive repairs and maintenance based on sound asset condition data help to shape positive impressions of property services delivery. Osborne has seen this effect in action across multiple property services partnerships.
Other Benefits of TAM
Adopting a Total Asset Management (TAM) approach has benefits beyond influencing a positive outcome from TSM surveys. The approach saves money, reduces risk and allows budgets to be managed more accurately.
There are many reasons why TSM and TAM go together naturally. For more information about Osborne’s approach to TAM and resident satisfaction contact Jo Fletcher ([email protected]).
