Your Home
Your home is at the core of your relationship with us. Working together, we’ll make sure you can continue to enjoy it. This page sets out the services we’ll deliver and what we ask of you in return.
Our offer to you: a safe, affordable, well-maintained quality home.
We’ll make sure your home is:
- Safe, with all installations checked, tested and signed off as meeting our Home Standard as legally required.
- Affordable, costing you at least 20% less than the market.
- Well maintained, with a responsive repair service that is open 24/7 for emergencies.
- Quality, meeting our Home Standard.
What we ask of you: keep your home in the same condition as when you moved in.
- When you move in, you’ll sign an inventory to document the condition of your home.
- From then on, you’ll be responsible for keeping it in this condition. This includes decorating, cleaning, and tidying of your home and garden plus any repairs that are your responsibility. We ask that you report any repairs that are Thrive’s responsibility promptly and allow us access to complete them.
If we own communal areas around your home, we’ll work with you to maintain them too. You can read full details in our Communal Areas Standard.
Communal areas include gardens surrounding a block, entrance halls, staircases and any bin and storage areas.
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Our Home Standard: inventory and annual HomePlan visits
We’re proud to offer safe, secure, quality homes.
Our Home Standard sets out the condition our homes will be let in and the standard we’ll maintain them to.
At the start of your tenancy, the condition of your home will be recorded in an inventory which both Thrive and you will sign. The inventory records any obvious existing wear and tear to the property - with photographic records - and proves the condition of the property in the event of any dispute.
We will then carry out a Home Plan visit once a year to confirm who is living in the property, assess its condition and check the terms of the tenancy agreement are being met. It’s an opportunity to highlight any issues that need to be fixed and to get an up-to-date record of the property’s condition. Following the Home Plan visit we will schedule any non-emergency repairs into one visit where possible, so it may be easier for you to wait for your Home Plan visit to notify us of any non-emergency repairs.
At the end of the tenancy we’ll carry out a final inventory inspection. You can find out more in our Home Standard and our Inventory Factsheet.
Alterations, wear and tear and damage
Your tenancy agreement requires you to keep your home in the same condition as it was when you moved in.
To make sure all our homes stay in good condition, we don’t allow customers to make alterations to their homes. You can put up pictures, shelves or brackets, but these must be removed and returned to its former state at the end of the tenancy. We will charge for rectifying any alterations identified.
You are not responsible for maintenance costs caused by fair wear and tear. However, you are responsible for careless or deliberate damage to your home, and you must either rectify the damage yourself or ask us to do so at a charge.
You can find out more about our charges in our Statement of Charges and Compensation.
Repairs
Most repairs needed in your home will be identified at your annual Home Plan visit. We’ll return at a convenient time to carry them out in one appointment where possible, although some repairs might be done as part of a programme of planned works (such as a bathroom upgrade). Your home should then be ‘repair free’ until your next Home Plan visit.
If you need a repair, first check who is responsible and what our timescales are by clicking here and choosing the relevant way to report it.
Emergency repairs: where health and safety is at risk or the property may be damaged, we operate an out of hours service on 0800 917 6077.
Access to your home
Sometimes we will need to visit your home to undertake repairs, safety checks and inspections. We will normally give at least 24 hours’ notice of a visit and you will need to give us access to the property. Whenever possible, we will work with you to find a convenient time to attend.
If you’re unable to keep your appointment, you must let us know as soon as possible and ideally at least 24 hours before your appointment. Should you fail to notify us and we attend your appointment then any repair jobs will be closed and a charge issued to you. If we miss an appointment on the day without giving you notice we will pay you compensation in accordance with our Statement of Charges and Compensation.
In limited circumstances, we may need access to your home without giving notice. This might be to carry out essential emergency repairs, to remedy a health and safety risk, or where there is reason to believe a customer is incapacitated. We will always make sure your home is secure afterwards.
If we have difficulty contacting you, we may make unannounced visits. You will not be charged if you are not in when we call, but if you don’t respond to a request to contact us this will trigger a tenancy investigation.
Please let us know if you’re going to be away for more than 28 days and who your point of contact will be during this time.
Charges
We will charge you in advance for any services that fall outside our contractual obligations set out in the Tenancy Agreement. We apply charges in a fair, consistent and transparent manner and you will be notified about any charges you need to pay.
Charges will be recovered as additional rent. You can find more details about services we charge for and when charges will be made in our Statement of Charges and Compensation.
Monitoring our performance
We aim to always deliver on our offer to you and we monitor our performance. You can read more about this in Customer Measures.
Permissions
There are a number of things we ask customers to seek our prior written permission on. These are outlined in your tenancy agreement and include (but are not limited to) requesting to:
- keep a pet
- erect a shed
- make any alteration, additions or improvements to your home (except for decorative fixtures i.e. putting up pictures, shelves or brackets). This includes, but is not limited to, replacing your kitchen or bathroom and extends to changing light fittings, radiators, removing/adding partition walls and changing fire doors
- install a satellite dish
- install CCTV, including video doorbells (please see our guidance on this by clicking here)
- operate a business from your home
- park a vehicle weighing over 3.5 tonnes or any caravan, motorhome, or boat at your home
- take down, replace, build or renew any boundary fence, gate or wall
- cut down or remove any boundary hedge or tree.
We will not usually refuse permission providing certain conditions are met that are within Thrive’s control. Once changes are agreed, we will review and update your inventory to reflect these updates. You can find out more and request permission on the myThrive hub at: portal.thrivehomes.org.uk/contact-us
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