In October 2017, we will be introducing Fair Landlord to make sure all of our customers get a fair deal from Severnside.
By introducing Fair Landlord we are committing to ensuring that our spending, investment and actions are fair for all of our customers.
That means planning our spending to benefit more of our customers.
Being a Fair Landlord isn’t about us making cuts or reducing services. We will look carefully at our costs and ask two simple questions:
Our Fair Landlord approach will ensure that we can maintain investment in home improvements, keep building new homes and deliver a great repairs and maintenance service.
Under Fair Landlord we will be:
If we speak to you about your rent when you contact us or call you to discuss rent arrears, please don’t worry! We are trying to help you.
Paying your rent is a key part of the tenancy agreement you have with us. It is your responsibility to make sure that your rent is paid on time – whether you pay your rent yourself or it is paid by someone else, including housing benefit.
Keeping rent arrears down ensures that customers who pay their rent on time, every time, are not unfairly subsidising other customers’ rent arrears.
The rent that you pay covers the cost of repairs and maintenance, helps us to provide new homes in local communities and means that we can invest in more home improvements.
Although our rent arrears fell to 0.95% last year, this equates to a reduction in income of over £255,000. The more of this outstanding money that we can collect, the more new kitchen, bathrooms and energy-efficient boilers we can install.
With further Welfare Reform Housing Benefit changes being introduced in February 2018, for all working age customers, we anticipate that rent arrears may rise. It is therefore vitally important that we continue to work with customers to help reduce arrears.
Need help?
If you are struggling to pay your rent, or have concerns about debt, it is really important that you talk to us. We can work together to try to ensure you don’t fall into rent debt and risk losing your home.
There are many ways we can help you. You can be referred to our employment and money advice team, who offer specialist money and benefit advice, or we can sign-post you to one of our partner agencies who also offer support to manage your money.
For further information please contact our customer services team on 0300 300 0059 or email enquiries@severnsidehousing.co.uk.
What Fair Landlord means for your repair service?
It means that we keep our promises.
It means that we will do everything that we are obliged to do in the tenancy agreement and do it really well. It also means that we will make savings by NOT doing the work which isn’t our responsibility and invest those savings in more home improvements and planned maintenance.
Which jobs are your responsibility and when to call the repairs team
There are some repairs which are OUR responsibility and some which are YOURS. The easy way to remember this is that we look after the structure of your home and its fixtures, as well as any communal areas like entrance halls or shared landings. To help you understand which repairs you are responsible for we have produced a ‘who to call, at-a-glance repairs checklist’ which you can cut out and keep.
The checklist also tells you what additional repairs you can request us to undertake, at affordable prices.
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Repair |
Our responsibility |
Your responsibility |
Chargeable service available |
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Lighting in communal entrance or landing |
✔ |
|
|
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Blocked guttering |
Cleared as part of the MOT programme |
|
|
|
Window won’t close or open |
✔ |
|
|
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Broken shower (which we fitted) |
✔ |
|
|
|
Leaking roof |
✔ |
|
|
|
Loss of power |
✔ |
|
|
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Problem with your hot water or heating |
Call PH Jones on 0800 316 2104
|
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|
|
Decorating the outside of your home |
Completed as part of the MOT programme |
|
|
|
Repair tap or kitchen unit |
✔ |
|
|
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Broken or misted glass in windows |
Replaced as part of the MOT programme |
|
|
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Blocked sink or toilet, replacement toilet seat |
|
✔ |
✔ |
|
Condensation |
|
✔ |
|
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Lost key |
|
✔ |
|
|
|
✔ |
✔ |
|
|
✔ |
✔ |
|
New bulb for lighting inside your home or for your security lighting |
|
✔ |
✔ |
|
Fixtures and fittings (e.g. curtain rails) |
|
✔ |
|
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Minor crack in the plaster inside your home |
|
✔ |
|
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Pest control (e.g. bees, wasps or squirrels) |
|
✔ |
|
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Replacing a blown fuse |
|
✔ |
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Damaged electrical socket (except fair wear and tear) |
|
✔ |
✔ |
|
Decorating the inside of your home |
|
✔ |
|
Property Plus, who deliver repair and maintenance services to Severnside customers, have already launched their award-winning MOT programme in Shropshire and customers love it!
We have a target to complete MOT’s at 20% of our homes each year, so in the next 5 years all of our homes will benefit from the introduction of this new programme.
The MOT team will work through homes an area at a time. When the team arrive at your home they have a checklist of work which might need to be done:
Jobs done as part of the MOT checklist will no longer be carried out as routine repairs. Therefore, if you need this kind of work carried out in your home please don’t request a repair as we will only be able to carry out the work when the MOT teams are next scheduled to visit your neighbourhood.
The only time you should let us know about a checklist repair is when it presents a danger – for instance when uneven paving becomes a trip hazard or when you believe that further damage will be caused, for example, overflowing guttering that will lead to damp in your home.
Over the last few months we have already completed MOT’s in a number of areas and the MOT team are scheduled to visit the following addresses over the next few months:
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Meole Brace |
Harlescott Grange |
Ditherington |
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Chiltern Close Knolls Farm Close Maesbrook Road Ryton Close Stapleton Road Wayford Close
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Aynesworth Green Beaufort Green Langford Green York Rd
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Wingfield Close Wingfield Gardens Whitehouse Gardens
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If the MOT team are planning to undertake an MOT at your home you will receive a letter outlining what the MOT covers and when you can expect their visit.
We are currently developing a five year MOT programme for Shropshire. It will set out where and when MOT’s will be carried out and will be uploaded to this website as soon as its available.
Because customer service is so important to us, we have previously carried out a lot of repairs which are not our responsibility as a landlord. When a customer asks for something to be fixed in their home, we try to help even if we aren’t actually responsible for doing the work.
This means that some customers get a bigger share of our resources. That isn’t fair on the majority of customers who pay their rent but don’t benefit from investment in improvements to their home. By spending fairly we can do MORE.
Any savings made under Fair Landlord will be re-invested to provide MORE:
We have already improved the specification of the kitchens and bathrooms we install as part of our planned maintenance programme. Better quality fittings last longer and look great for longer. You can find out what Vicky Floyd thinks of her new high-spec bathroom on page [xx]
We are developing a new planned maintenance programme for Shropshire. It will set out where and when planned maintenance work will be carried out and will be uploaded to this website as soon as it's available.
