Customer Annual Report 2024

A message from our CEO

Welcome to our Customer Annual Report 2024. Last year, we began making important changes at A2Dominion. Listening to your feedback, we know we haven’t been performing to the standards you expect and deserve. 

We’ve been working with customers more to develop plans for improving your services and shaping future priorities. We’re making progress, and while we recognise there’s still lots to do, we’re determined to get there.  The key areas we’re focusing on are:  

Responding to your enquiries more quickly, without you having to chase us
Delivering a faster and better-quality repairs service
Tackling damp and mould and anti-social behaviour more effectively
Increasing satisfaction with how we resolve your complaints
Getting more customers involved in shaping our services.

Our grading from the regulator

Last year, the Regulator of Social Housing reviewed our regulatory grading, which indicates how well we’re meeting its standards. We’d become concerned that we weren’t meeting regulatory standards for some areas and services, so we made what’s known as a self-referral.

The regulator’s assessment showed that whilst we continued to meet its financial viability requirements (known as V2), we needed to make significant improvements to our governance arrangements to fully comply with its Governance & Financial Viability Standard. We were downgraded from a compliant G1 rating to a non-complaint G3 rating.

We’re now working closely with the regulator to deliver our improvement plans to help us return to a fully compliant governance grading.

Customer satisfaction

Last year, the regulator introduced Tenant Satisfaction Measures (TSMs) to show how well social housing landlords are doing at providing good-quality homes and services to tenants and shared owners. These measures have been adopted by all social landlords as a way to compare and benchmark performance.

Overall satisfaction with our services was 58% among social and affordable rent customers and shared owners, below our 63% target and lower compared to other housing associations.

Whilst we do some things well, we also know some things don’t go well at all for you. Many of the concerns you spoke with us about relate to the issues we’re working to address. Take a look.

We have a clear plan of improvement over the next 2 to 3 years and we are all committed to building stronger foundations and doing better for you. If you’d like to get involved in helping us improve and shape services, there are lots of ways to do this
How can I take part in your Customer Involvement Programme?

Investing in communities

Over the past year, we’ve continued to invest in the communities where we work.

We built 668 much-needed new homes, invested £38m into fire safety works and supported more than 2,000 customers to access £9.7m grants and benefits. You can find out more about our work later on in this report.

Best wishes,

Ian Wardle
Chief Executive Officer

Overview: How did we do?

78% said you were satisfied with our repairs, complaints and contact centre services… ...but we know that many of you have an experience with us that is not as good as it should be. Our improvement plan is focused on delivering a better repairs service, responding to your enquiries more effectively and resolving complaints faster. We’re making progress but we know there’s still lots to do.

We fixed 70% of repairs on our first visit This was in line with our 70% target. We know that a quick and good quality repairs service is a priority. Last year we completed 95,000 repairs in your homes. We’re working towards fixing more repairs first time to give you a better experience. We also introduced a new live tracking service so you can see how we’re progressing your repair.

Your safety is our top priority Following the tragic Grenfell fire, we carried out surveys on more than 700 tall buildings and identified 65 buildings needing work to fix cladding issues. With £38m invested to date, we’re on track to complete our fire safety programme by 2026. We’ve put interim safety measures in place where needed, carry out regular fire safety risk assessments and provide on-going support to affected customers.

We built 668 new homes last year to help meet housing need Of these, 329 were affordable including for shared ownership and affordable rent. We reinvest all our profits into delivering new homes and services.

We’ve been supporting customers affected by cost of living increases Last year, we helped more than 2,000 customers experiencing financial difficulty to gain a total of £9.7m in funding, including through benefits and grants.

Service charge costs increased last year due to rising costs for providing insurance and services We’ve worked to keep costs as low as possible and don’t make any profit from service charges. But we know rising costs are impacting customers. We’re striving to ensure good value for money through the services we buy and offer support to those who need it.

We resolved 72% of complaints at the first stage of investigation. We know we need to do much better which is why we’re making changes to improve how we investigate and communicate with you, and to respond to you faster.

Repairs

We’re committed to ensuring homes are safe and maintained to a good standard.

Last year, we carried out 95,000 repairs. We completed 70% of these on our first visit, with each repair taking on average 14 days to complete (against our 15-day target and better than the year before). We spent £38m on completing these repairs.

We also continually invest in improvements to the homes we manage, spending £13.6m last year on installing:

Over 400 new bathrooms and kitchens
More than 800 new windows and doors
New roofs at 37 developments
On-going repairs and redecorations.

View Tenant Satisfaction Measures: Repairs

	Social and affordable rent	Compared to our target for 2023/24	Our target 2024/25
Proportion of homes that do not meet the Decent Homes Standard.	0.6%	1%	0.75%
Proportion of non-emergency responsive repairs completed within the landlord’s target timescale.	68.8%
Proportion of emergency responsive repairs completed within the landlord’s target timescale.	66.6%

	Social and affordable rent	G15* landlords 2023/24 (social and affordable rent)	Compared to our target for 2023/24	Our target 2024/25
Satisfaction with our overall repairs service (from customers who’ve had a repair in the last 12 months)	57.2%	62.3%	55%	60%
Satisfaction with the time taken to complete your most recent repair (from customers who’ve had a repair in the last 12 months)	54.6%	59.3%	55%	60%
Satisfaction that your home is well maintained	54.9%	62.4%	58%	60%

Our repairs improvement plan

We know our repairs service isn’t as good as it should be, which is why we’ve developed a rapid repairs improvement plan to help us deliver a faster and better-quality service.

We started with appointing a new repairs contractor, Mears, and our focus has been on working together to get the basics right. We also recruited a new senior leadership team including A2Dominion’s first Repairs & Maintenance Director, Jo Evans, whose priority is delivering the improvements.

Changes we’ve made so far include:

Launching a live tracking service, so you can understand progress with your repair and communicate with your operative directly via text message
A new process to ensure we carry out a more thorough assessment of your repair at the first stage to ensure we fix more repairs first time
New timescales for when repairs will be completed.

Customer case study

A2Dominion customer Andrew Grattan, who lives in Spelthorne, used the live tracking portal for his repair, and said:

“I think it’s a really good idea. It was useful for managing my appointment for having the extractor fan replaced in my kitchen. I liked receiving a text message on the day telling me that the contractor would be arriving in a certain timeframe.

“Being able to contact him directly and track him on his way to me worked well. Although my repair couldn’t be completed that day, he was friendly and professional and explained why the repair couldn’t be completed. I received new appointment details soon after the appointment.”

Future improvements

We will be:

Ensuring our repairs vans are better stocked with the most frequently needed parts. This means we can complete your repair quicker as our operatives don’t need to source parts as often from suppliers
Adding more qualified surveyors to our team to assess complex repairs and carry out inspections to ensure the quality of the work completed
Enhanced training for our repairs teams, including customer experience training to improve our communication with residents.

Complaints

If you’re unhappy with a service, we’ll always do our best to put things right. We’re working to make improvements to how we investigate and resolve your complaints, including getting back to you quicker.

We received 5,497 complaints last year, with key themes being repairs, response times and communication. Last year, we resolved 72% of cases at the first stage of investigation, below our 82% target. If you’re not happy with the outcome, your complaint moves to stage 2 and we investigate further.

We have a 10-day target for resolving all Stage 1 complaints, set by the housing ombudsman and 20 days for a Stage 2 complaint.

Last year, 42% of stage 1 complaints and 68% of stage 2 complaints were resolved in this timeframe. 1.3% of complaints were escalated to the housing ombudsman for further investigation, above our 1% target.

View Tenant Satisfaction Measures: Complaints

	Social and affordable rent customers	Shared ownership customers	G15* landlords 2023/24 (social and affordable rent)	G15* landlords 2023/24 (shared ownership)	Compared to our target for 2023/24	Our target 2024/25
Satisfaction with our approach to handing your complaint (from customers who’ve made a complaint in the last 12 months)	32.5%	9.5%	30.8%	14.6%	38%	40%

	Social and affordable rent customers	Shared ownership customers	Compared to our target for 2023/24	Our target 2024/25
Number of stage one complaints received per 1,000 homes.	151.8	143.5	111 (social and affordable rent target) 79 (shared ownership target)	108 (social and affordable rent target) 77 (shared ownership target)
Number of stage two complaints received per 1,000 homes.	21.9	32.7	6 (social and affordable rent target)  8 (shared ownership target)	6 (social and affordable rent target) 8 (shared ownership target)
Proportion of stage one complaints responded to within the Housing Ombudsman’s Complaint Handling Code timescales.	43.5%	38.5%	100%	100%
Proportion of stage two complaints responded to within the Housing Ombudsman’s Complaint Handling Code timescales.	63.1%	76.7%	100%	100%
Proportion of stage one complaints responded to within the Housing Ombudsman’s Complaint Handling Code timescales.	43.5%	38.5%	100%	100%
Proportion of stage two complaints responded to within the Housing Ombudsman’s Complaint Handling Code timescales.	63.1%	76.7%	100%	100%

We regret that there were 4 cases where the housing ombudsman issued Complaint Handling Failure Orders. This was because we took too long to respond or provide information.

There were also 10 cases that had severe maladministration. A severe maladministration is when we have taken too long to address issues and are required to provide higher levels of redress. We’ve offered our sincere apologies to the individual residents affected. We fully accepted the ombudsman’s findings and recommendations and we’re using what we’ve learnt to drive improvements.

Improvements we’ve made

In the last year we’ve:

Made it easier for you to report a complaint in different ways, including in-person, online, by letter or by phone
Introduced complaints champions across the organisation, who investigate complaints and develop action plans to put things right
Launched a new system to help us better monitor and track complaints and spot if there is a delay
Improved how we assess and award compensation payments, so they are based on what is considered fair in the circumstance of the case in line with ombudsman guidance. We’ve also simplified the policy so you can better understand how we decide on payments.

Future improvements

We will be:

Holding customer feedback workshops focusing on complaints and communication.
Working towards new timescales for resolving complaints in line with the Housing Ombudsman Service’s code and guidance. We’ll acknowledge your complaint within 5 working days and respond within 10 working days (unless we need more time to investigate)
Streamlining the process for communicating with the Housing Ombudsman Service about complaints that have been escalated
Setting up a Resident Complaint Quality Assurance group to scrutinise anonymised complaint letters. Their feedback will drive changes to our complaint responses and inform staff training.

Home safety

Our top priority is ensuring your home is safe and well-maintained.

Fire safety programme

Our fire safety programme began in 2019 with a focus on replacing cladding where needed to comply with government safety regulations. We carried out 770 inspections and identified 65 buildings requiring work. We’ve invested £38m to date and our remediation programme is on track, due to complete in 2026. Last year we:

Supported customers by responding to 6,500 building and fire safety enquiries
Secured £8.4m from the government’s Building Safety Fund to pay towards remediation works at 6 buildings
Set up an Enhanced Housing Management Team to provide additional support to customers in complex buildings and 600 tall and mid-rise buildings impacted by the Fire Safety Act and Building Safety Act.

Damp and mould

Last year, we launched a major new project to tackle damp and mould more quickly and effectively. To date, we’ve:

Reviewed 5,366 historical cases of damp and mould, contacting customers to ensure issues are fully resolved and arranging any further works where needed
Received 3,033 new cases of damp and mould
Introduced new case managers to support customers in more complex cases.

View Tenant Satisfaction Measures: Safety

	Social and affordable rent customers	Shared ownership customers	G15* landlords 2023/24 (social and affordable rent)	G15* landlords 2023/24 (shared ownership)	Compared to our target for 2023/24	Our target 2024/25
Satisfaction that your home is safe	63.9%	39.2%	70.6%	55.6%	65%	68%

	Combined result	(Low cost rental accommodation and low cost home ownership)	Compared to our target for 2023/24
Proportion of homes for which all required gas safety checks have been carried out.	92.8%	100%	100%
Proportion of homes for which all required fire risk assessments have been carried out.	90.2%	100%	100%
Proportion of homes for which all required asbestos management surveys or re-inspections have been carried out.	99.0%	100%	100%
Proportion of homes for which all required legionella risk assessments have been carried out.	79.2%	100%	100%
Proportion of homes for which all required communal passenger lift safety checks have been carried out.	89.8%	100%	100%

Customer case study

A2Dominion customer Andy Walker has lived in his leasehold flat in Ealing for almost 15 years. The development, which is managed by A2Dominion’s Enhanced Housing Management Team, has had its cladding replaced and other fire safety works completed. Andy says he has benefited from having a dedicated property manager who is on site regularly and on hand to resolve issues.

Andy said: “The creation of the Enhanced Housing Management Team is greatly welcomed. I find it easy to contact the manager for this estate. He is often seen within the building and is approachable and helpful.

“I am a wheelchair-user and have had on-going problems with an automated door in my corridor. The local property manager is doing much more to resolve this problem. Things are changing for the better.

“I believe that this informal and ongoing face-to-face relationship with a member of the estate team works really well and results in better outcomes for everyone.”

Future priorities

We will be:

Strengthening our technical teams to help us address damp and mould even faster
Continuing to deliver our fire safety remediation programme
Continuing to share information with customers on how to stay safe at home and how to contact us for help
Introducing new technologies to help reduce condensation levels and identify issues at an earlier stage by 2025/26
Ensuring we comply with the changes being proposed with Awaab’s Law.

Rent and service charge

Our performance

Rents

Last year, social housing rents increased by 7.7%, in line with government rules. Shared ownership rents increased in line with individual lease agreement terms. We wrote to you to provide advance notice and explain the support available for anyone struggling with finances.

Service charge

Service charge costs increased last year due to rising prices for services such as cleaning, lift maintenance, buildings insurance and the price and high demand for materials and tradespeople.

We don’t make any money from service charges; we only recover the costs of providing the services. We strive to achieve good value for money through our contracts.

Last year we had 2,595 service charge queries which we answered in an average of 23 days, ahead of our 30-day target. Last year 0.74% of service charge estimates were revised due to an error.

Rent arrears

We saw a 57% increase in referrals for help with money management last year. However, because of the many support schemes on offer, the number of our customers in rent arrears remained relatively low at 3.6%. Whilst this was marginally higher than our 3.4% target, it was among the lowest level in the G15, a group of London’s largest housing associations.

Future improvements

We’ve set up a working group to review and improve how we set and check service charge costs. This will help to ensure service charge estimates are more accurate and increase your confidence in the information we provide you.

Customer case study

Coretta Scott has been an A2Dominion customer for 13 years and is a resident member of the Customer Services Committee, which is consulted on performance and key projects.

She said: “I am passionate about making sure the voice of our customers is considered when decisions are being made at A2Dominion. As a resident, I have lived experience of the services provided, such as reporting a repair or querying a service charge. This enables me to help influence change and improve customer experience.

“I’ve really valued the opportunity to be part of the Customer Services Committee and have learnt a lot about resident involvement and the impact it can have on lives, homes, services and communities.

“A2Dominion is making it much easier for customers to get involved and share their experience. It is a huge step towards embedding a culture across the organisation that values the voice and experience of residents.”

Neighbourhoods

We want your neighbourhood to be a safe and peaceful place to live which is why we’re committed to tackling anti-social behaviour and fly-tipping.

Anti-social behaviour

Last year we investigated 652 cases of Anti-Social Behaviour (ASB), resolving each case in 72 days on average, ahead of our 90-day target. However, more complex cases of ASB, such as those involving legal action, can take longer to resolve.

You’ve told us that you want us to improve how we tackle ASB. Last year we launched our ASB improvement plan and so far we’ve:

Made it easier for you to report ASB by updating our online customer portal
Introduced new technology and systems to help us better record, track and respond to cases
Set up a dedicated ASB team and delivered specialist training so that our colleagues are better equipped to resolve disputes more effectively.

Future improvements

We’ll be continuing to listen to your feedback through our customer engagement panels to understand how we can improve your experience
We’re training members of our ASB Resolution team to become qualified mediators to help customers come to a resolution before issues escalate
We’ll be working with partner organisations, such as councils and local police neighbourhood teams, to share good practice and advice.

Fly-tipping

We're legally required to remove items that have been dumped or instances of bin contamination as they can become a health and safety risk.

Unfortunately, we saw an increase in fly-tipping across many of our developments last year, costing in total £1.5m to remove. We understand this can be frustrating for customers, as these costs need to be paid for through service charges. This is why we continue to ask you to help us to deter people from fly-tipping by letting us know when it happens. This allows us to investigate and take action where we can.

Cleaning

At some schemes, you said that cleaning and maintenance needs to be improved. We’re making improvements at schemes where we’ve had high volumes of complaints, increasing frequency of cleaning and better management of our contractors. We’re also doing more regular inspections to help us to spot issues quicker so we can put things right.

View Tenant Satisfaction Measures: Neighbourhood management

	Social and affordable rent customers	Shared ownership customers	G15* landlords 2023/24 (social and affordable rent)	G15* landlords 2023/24 (shared ownership)	Compared to our target for 2023/24	Our target 2024/25
Satisfaction that we keep communal areas clean and well-maintained	60.9%	40.2%	62.2%	44.3%	56%	57%
Satisfaction that we make a positive contribution to the neighbourhood	47.2%	21.1%	57.1%	30.7%	44%	45%
Satisfaction with our approach to handling anti-social behaviour.	47.7%	18.0%	55.9%	29.8%	40%	42%

	Combined satisfaction result (Low cost rental accommodation and low cost home ownership)	Compared to our target for 2023/24	Our target 2024/25
Anti-social behaviour cases relative to the size of the landlord	23.0	19	18
Number of anti-social behaviour cases that involve hate incidents opened per 1,000 homes	6.4

Customer feedback

We listen to, value and act on your views. As our customer you have first-hand experience of our services. You know whether things are going well, and what could be better.

Our performance

Customer engagement panel

Last year, we set up a new Customer Engagement Panel to get more people involved in shaping and improving our services. More than 200 customers have signed-up and we’ve run surveys and workshops on complaints, contacting us, reviewing policies and digital services. Find out more.

Customer survey programme

We gathered feedback from over 13,000 customers last year. We invite customers to give feedback by phone and text, after using our services.

We share the results each month within A2Dominion to inform action and improvement plans. If you’ve not been receiving our surveys and would like to opt in, please contact us via our Live Chat service or call us on 0800 432 0077.

Improving our communications

We want our communications to be clear and easy to understand. You’ve told us that you need faster responses and that it can sometimes be difficult to contact the right person. We’re working to improve these areas through our customer experience transformation projects.

Some of you told us that you face barriers in accessing our communications due to requiring them in a different format, such as Braille or large print. We offer an accessible communications service and are promoting this more widely across customer touchpoints. Find out more.

Changes to our annual report

Based on your feedback, we’ve made changes to this year’s annual report:

You told us you wanted more specific information about the improvements we’re making which is why we’ve included improvement sections throughout the report
We’ve included a snapshot of our performance at the top as some customers told us they only want a summary
You said you wanted more relevant, tailored content which is why we’ve created specific annual report emails for tenants, leaseholders and shared owners.

View Tenant Satisfaction Measures: Respectful and helpful engagement

	Social and affordable rent customers	Shared ownership customers	G15* landlords 2023/24 (social and affordable rent)	G15* landlords 2023/24 (shared ownership)	Compared to our target for 2023/24	Our target 2024/25
Satisfaction that we listen to your views and act upon them	47.4%	18.3%	52.6%	25.3%	49%	52%
Satisfaction that we keep you informed about things that matter to them	59.4%	34.9%	65.6%	47.7%	59%	60%
Satisfaction that we treat you fairly and with respect	62.7%	33.8%	69.9%	47.6%	63%	65%

Customer case study

A2Dominion customer David Kingsley signed up to take part in our customer engagement programme. He is now a member of a customer panel providing feedback on digital services and customer communications.

He said: “Resident engagement is so valuable. I really enjoy being part of the customer panel as it provides an opportunity to engage with residents from different backgrounds, hear their views and build trust.”

Costs of providing services

As a not-for-profit housing organisation, we reinvest all our income into providing homes and services. We have several income sources, with the largest from social rent income (59% in 2023/24).

59% Social rent 20.5% Property Sales 8.5% Non-social rent 6.4% Property disposals 3.2% Leasehold services 0.7% Supporting people services 0.7% Other 0.5% Management Services 0.5% Share of joint venture surplus

Spending our income

We reinvest our income from social rents into covering costs of things such as repairs and maintenance. The table below shows what is spent where for each £1 we receive.

£0.33 Management costs* £0.29 Planned and major repairs £0.19 Routine maintenance £0.17 Service charge costs £0.01 Bad debts £0.01 Property lease charges

*Management costs include managing and maintaining customers’ homes and staff costs.

How do our costs compare to other housing associations?

The table below shows how we spend our income per social rent home that we own and manage compared to other social housing landlords.

	Average cost per social rent home 2023/24 (£)	Sector 2022/23 average (plus 5.7% CPI) (£)
Management costs	2,375	1,399
Service charge costs	1,235	935
Maintenance costs (including responsive repairs, planned maintenance and major repairs)	3,440	2,810
Other costs, including community investment	602	1,032
Total	7,652	6,176

Note: We have sourced publicly available information for 2022/23 as our benchmark and applied an average inflation of 5.7% for consumer price index covering the 12 month period to March 2024.

Reducing our costs

In recent years, several factors have caused our operational costs to increase. We know that, currently, the amount we spend each year on managing our social rented homes is higher than the average of our peers in the sector.

We are working to reduce our costs and have made savings and efficiencies of £5.6m in 2023/24 with a further £17.4m in 2024/25.

Most of these savings will be redirected and reinvested as we balance lowering our costs and continuing to support our increased focus on customer care and investment in homes to ensure they are safe and effectively managed.

Key investment areas include repairs, redevelopment and regeneration of homes and estates and our complaints service.

Directors’ remuneration costs

The information below shows our directors’ costs per each social rent home. These are new measures required by the Regulator of Social Housing, and from next year, we’ll be able to display peer comparisons.

	Actual 2023/24	Target for 2023/24	Target for 2024/25
The remuneration payable to the highest paid director relative to the size of the landlord*	£9	£9	£9
The aggregate amount of remuneration paid to directors, relative to the size of the landlord**	£61	£60	£57

*This is the total amount of pay including basic pay, any performance-related pay and benefits in kind excluding employer pension and national insurance contributions divided by the number of social housing units owned and managed.

**This is the total amount of pay including basic salary, any performance-related pay and benefits in kind including employer pension and national insurance contributions divided by the number of social housing units owned and managed.

Investing in communities

We invest in and provide support for local communities, from building new affordable homes, to helping those in financial difficulty and delivering homelessness and domestic abuse support services.

Last year:

We generated £12.3m in social value through our work with communities helping customers with employment, training, wellbeing and more.

Social value is a way to measure the impact of our projects. The social value calculator, used across the housing sector, enables us to quantify the value of things such as support for wellbeing and mental health, and to measure the unseen financial value of our services to the people and communities who have used them.

We built 668 much-needed new homes

Of these, 329 were affordable including homes for shared ownership, affordable and social rent. We reinvest 100% of our profits back into developing more new homes and services across London and southern England.

We supported 2,245 customers to access £9.7m in financial support.

This included:

Help with 1,000 benefit claims
Provided access to £104,000 of grant and charitable funding to support with access to furniture, white goods, and food banks
Supported 100 customers with £28,000 of funding from A2Dominion to help with the purchase of white goods and furniture, support with debts, purchasing school uniform and more
Helped 30 families who were at risk of losing their home due to rent arrears to access Local Authority Household Support Funding with an average award of £1,500 in one off payments to clear rent arrears and stay in their homes.

We supported 2,596 people who contacted our domestic abuse service

Our trained staff provide confidential advice and guidance, as well as practical support including:

A refuge for those feeling abuse
A team of professionals who can help people with accessing services to rebuild their life
Guidance such as safety planning, moving home and accessing benefits
Support to access counselling and therapy.

We provided accommodation and support for 91 people who were homeless

Our hostel in Oxfordshire offers people aged over 18 a safe place to stay and a programme of support to help move off the streets permanently. Residents have their own support worker and are given help to find a new home.

Tell us what you think

Thanks for reading our Customer Annual Report. Please tell us what you think by completing our short online survey and we’ll use your feedback to improve future reports. By taking part by 31 October 2024, you’ll be entered into a draw to win £25 of Amazon vouchers.** You can also give your feedback by calling us on 0800 432 0077.

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More information

We’ll continue to keep you updated with our progress through our monthly customer newsletter on our website and across our social channels. For more information about any of our services, visit our customer website Help section. You can also speak to your Neighbourhood Officer or Property & Safety Manager, or contact us by phone.

If you need this information in a different format or language, please visit a2dominion.co.uk/translations or call 0800 432 0077.