Moving forward | Strategic report
Focusing on customers and communities
We’re proud to make a positive difference to thousands of people’s lives, but we always want to do more. Throughout the past year, we’ve set out to tackle the increasingly challenging issues faced by our communities.
Making a difference
Customers satisfied with our overall service
Number of formal complaints received
Throughout the past year, we’ve set out to tackle the increasingly challenging issues faced by our communities by focusing on delivering value for money to invest in homes and services that make a difference to our customers and the places they live.
Our customers are at the heart of everything we do and improving the services that they receive from us continues to be our top priority.
Three quarters of our customers (75 percent) told us that they were satisfied with the overall service they receive from us. This represents a slight increase on last year’s figure (74 percent) and underlines our continued commitment to delivering a better experience for our customers.
Improving our repairs service
The last 12 months have been another period of significant challenge and change for the Group.
In April 2021, recognising that the level of our repairs service had fallen below the standard we expect and our customers deserve, we announced the start of a procurement exercise to appoint three new contractors, each responsible for delivering the service in their respective region.
“We know we still have a lot of work to do and it’ll take time to fully realise the benefits of reshaping our repairs service but we’re confident that things will improve.”
Following a significant amount of work, we’re delighted to have appointed Morgan Sindall Property Services (east region), Ian Williams Limited (west region) and Fortem Solutions (south region) from July 1, 2022.
As part of this initiative, and based on feedback from our customers, we’ve created a dedicated, in-house repairs call centre, which is based at our Boston office. The team fields all repairs calls and schedules appointments dynamically, ensuring greater efficiency and, most importantly, a better overall experience for our customers.
We know we still have a lot of work to do and it’ll take time to fully realise the benefits of reshaping our repairs service but we’re confident that things will improve.
Our performance
As part of our commitment to openness and transparency, this year, we began sharing quarterly performance statistics with our customers and stakeholders.
Our website now features details of overall performance in key areas of customer satisfaction, repairs and complaints. These reports highlight where we have performed well, as well as areas where improvement is required.
Working smarter together
The last 12 months have also seen our colleagues adapt to a new, more flexible way of working that we believe will enable them to achieve even more for our customers.
More of our colleagues are now working remotely, based within the communities we serve. This means they’re travelling much less than before, helping us to work with greater efficiently while lessening our impact on the environment.
Supporting our customers
Our customers are at the heart of everything we do and improving the services they receive from us continues to be our top priority.
Our Community Investment initiative was established in 2019 to support the delivery of our Improving Lives vision and our commitment to supporting customers with their mental and physical wellbeing and economic resilience.
Over the last 12 months, we’re proud to report that we achieved 6,125 positive outcomes for the individuals we’ve supported across our services, representing over £4 million* in social value.
The outcomes include supporting people in employment, enhancing their skills and making donations to customers and communities through the funds we provide.
*£4,088,899 – calculated using a blended and proportionate approach to identify social value, which has included HACTs, UK Social Value Bank and Insight tools, alongside unit cost databases and a range of publicly available financial proxies.
Employment and skills
Social impact
Number of outcomes
Garden support fund
Social impact
Number of outcomes
Health and Wellbeing
Social impact
Number of outcomes
Economic resilience
Social impact
Number of outcomes
Focusing on our communities
Donated to foodbanks
Community Heroes recognised
Customers supported in social isolation pilot
Community Heroes
Once again, the last 12 months have seen our customers go above and beyond to help others in their communities.
We've recognised those incredible efforts once again this year through our Community Heroes campaign, which saw 14 awards given out to truly deserving nominees.
Social isolation pilot
During the penultimate quarter of the last year, in partnership with our Care and Support service, we launched a pilot programme to tackle social isolation.
The pilot has enabled us to support 19 projects that support a total of 673 of our customers, all aged over 55 and living in our care and support schemes.
Foodbank donations
Amid the skyrocketing cost-of-living and as people continue to grapple with the economic after-effects of the Coronavirus pandemic, we’ve again supported foodbanks across our regions to help them meet the growing demand for their services.
Over the last financial year, we’ve made donations totalling £3,000, which equates to around 200 families.
Customer Wellbeing Hub
Over the last 12 months, we’ve also strengthened our offering to customers through our Wellbeing Hub.
The Hub includes details of our partners who offer directly commissioned services such as PayPlan, which provides free and impartial debt advice and access to mental health support through Vita HealthCare.
Moving forward
Related KPIs
Following another year of transition and change for the Group, we’re confident that we’ll soon begin to see the benefits of the incredible amount of work we’ve done over the last 12 months.
In the year ahead, we’re hopeful that customers will see the effect of our efforts to reshape our repairs service; with our three new regional contractors delivering a better level of service and our new ‘in-house’ repairs call centre providing a more efficient customer experience.
We understand that there is a significant amount of work still to be done to return to the level of service we expect and our customers deserve. This won’t be an overnight improvement, but we’re confident in the work that’s been done so far and the platform it’s given us to build on in the coming months.
With customer satisfaction our absolute priority, we’re looking closely at our complaints procedure and making continuous improvements.
As well as looking to resolve complaints more quickly, we’ll continue to learn from our mistakes and use our customers’ feedback to better shape our services in the future.
Over the next 12 months, we’ll also continue to improve the quality of the data that we hold – and the insight we can gain from it – helping to ensure we’re making informed decisions on the services that our customers receive.
We’ll continue to create sustainable communities that our customers can be proud of, supporting customers to fully resolve any problems and disputes, ensuring they enjoy living in their homes in in peaceful neighbourhoods.
We will step up our efforts to help customers better engage with us using more effective digital services, while retaining the ability to meet with our colleagues face-to-face and over the phone.
“As well as looking to resolve complaints more quickly, we’ll continue to learn from our mistakes and use our customers’ feedback to better shape our services in the future.”
As ever, we’ll initiate early interventions with any issues to help our customers to successfully manage and sustain their tenancies, while also supporting their health, wellbeing and economic resilience through our range of additional services.
We remain committed to taking our responsibilities to the planet seriously, and our communities will also be clear on our decarbonisation plans, having been engaged with and consulted on our work to transition to low-carbon throughout 2022/23 and beyond.
© Longhurst Group Limited
Longhurst Group Ltd is a charitable housing association registered in England as a community benefit society (Reg. No. 8009) and registered with the Regulator of Social Housing (No. L4277).
Registered Office: 1 Crown Court, Crown Way, Rushden, Northamptonshire NN10 6BS. VAT Reg No. 326 0270 36. A member of the National Housing Federation.