Annual complaint performance and service improvement report 2023/24

Introduction  

We are committed to providing services that make people’s lives easier. We seek feedback from residents on our services through monthly satisfaction surveys and encourage residents to let us know if we have got things wrong so that we can put them right.  

Our rolling monthly satisfaction survey results tells us that in 2023/24 61% of residents who rent from us were satisfied with the landlord services we provided. 69% of residents who rent thought their home was safe and 67% were satisfied with the repairs service.  

We compare our performance via Housemark and this shows our year end position on overall satisfaction compared to our London benchmark to be in the top 25%. We want to do better and will continue to respond to resident feedback in improving our services.       

The Annual Complaints and Service Improvement Report is an annual regulatory report that requires landlords and housing associations to report the number of complaints they’ve received that year, the lessons they’ve learned, and the results of their self-assessment against the Housing Ombudsman’s Complaints Handling Code.  

You can read here how we are listening and acting on resident feedback gathered through our wider survey programme.    

Looking Forward  

Our focus continuing into 2024/25 is to: 

• Reduce the need for residents to complain by getting the service right at the start.
• Continue to work to sustain recent positive changes to the repairs service. 
• Ensure stage 1 responses are comprehensive and action plans are monitored to reduce the need for stage 2 escalations.
• Make sure we have knowledge of and consider residents' additional support needs when handling service requests or complaints.
• Enhance our customer service culture with training for senior leaders and a relaunch of our Origin Oath customer service principles. 
• Improve internal collaboration to prevent delays when a cross-team approach is needed to resolve service issues or complaints. 

View from our Customer Services Committee and Member Responsible for Complaints   

In 2023/24 Vicky Bonner was the Chair of the Customer Services Committee  (she is now the Board Chair) and was appointed by the Board as the Member Responsible for Complaints.    

Vicky said :     

‘The Customer Services Committee and the wider Board receive quarterly updates on complaints handling. We are particularly  focused on the reasons behind complaints and how we learn and improve services as a result of this feedback. We are pleased that a number of service improvements were made during the year, and this remains an area that we focus on as a Committee. We are satisfied with our performance on responding to complaints on time and in the coming year will be monitoring our progress with the areas set out in section 5 ( ‘looking forward’) of this report.  

As the Member Responsible for Complaints, my role is to champion a positive complaint handling culture within Origin and seek assurance from the operational teams that complaints are being handled effectively. I fulfil this role in a number of ways including meeting with the complaints team and their manager to look at how they work, understanding how learning from complaints is happening, providing challenges on their monthly performance and sharing key messages with staff on complaint handling.’