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Winter 2024 newsletter
Keeping you informed about things that matter to you.
In this edition:
The importance of contents insurance
Upcoming Thrive Customer Voice Activities
How we’re managing complaints
Our research partner, IFF
Mutual exchange
Financial wellbeing
Bin stores / Fly Tipping
Damp & Mould
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Welcome to your winter newsletter
Hear the latest updates from Thrive Homes! From home safety tips to financial wellbeing, check out what advice and support is available to you.
Just like many other social housing providers, we are receiving more complaints compared to last year. It's important we meet our service standards and complaints give us feedback to improve.
For updates about our new contract, head to: thrivehomes.org.uk/service-updates
Each year with help from our Thrive Customer Voice members, we publish our Annual Report for Tenants. From property improvements to customer satisfaction, see how we’re performing for our customers.
Find out more in the full report online or contact us for a hardcopy! thrivehomes.org.uk/annualreport
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Are you covered?
As your landlord, we provide Buildings Insurance as part of your rent or service charge. While this will cover the cost of damage to the structure of your home, it will not cover the cost of replacing or repairing your possessions.
We strongly advise all our customers to take out a contents insurance policy. This will make sure your furniture and personal belongings are protected from damage and burglaries. It will also cover you from damage caused to other people’s property, for example if your washing machine floods the flat below.
For more details, head to: thrivehomes.org.uk/home-contents-insurance
Top tip: Use comparison sites to get the best value for your money. Always double check your policy provides the right level of cover for your belongings!
Other things you can do to protect your home:
- Dispose of nappies and sanitary products in the bin to avoid unwanted blockages.
- Keep candles away from Christmas trees, curtains or anything else that could catch fire.
- Make sure your home is well aired to help prevent damp, mould, and condensation.
Join Thrive Customer Voice today!
As a Thrive Customer Voice member, you can get involved in a range of activities to help shape our services at a time, pace, and place that suits you.
With help from Thrive Customer Voice members we're already improving our cleaning and ground maintenance service, reshaping our Downsizing and Neighbourhood Management policies, and using their input to support the recruitment of our new CEO.
Looking ahead, you can help us:
- Improve the experience of elderly and disabled customers.
- Develop home safety information that’s clear and accessible.
- Shape the way we write to you about complaints.
Become a Thrive Customer Voice member and get involved at: thrivehomes.org.uk/getinvolved
Need information in large print, or a different language? Let us know at thrivehomes.org.uk/my-info and remember, our website has a tool to translate, read-aloud and enlarge content! Simply click the [ ] button anywhere on our website.
Prefer a printed copy? Contact us!
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Your feedback matters
Over the past year, we’ve experienced a 13% increase in complaints like many other housing associations. This due to the launch of the new Housing Ombudsman Complaint Code, Government campaigns raising awareness, and our own proactive communications encouraging you to let us know when things go wrong. This feedback is giving us a good understanding of how we can improve your experience of our services.
We recognise that we need to do better at:
- doing what we say that we will do
- listening to customers views and acting upon them
- keeping you informed.
What are we doing to improve?
Taking on board your feedback, we’ve brought forward plans to renew and upgrade some of our communal door entry systems – we'll contact all customers this applies to. We’ve also increased appointment availability by hiring more engineers and colleagues in our repairs planning team.
We’re improving record keeping to make sure that we will do everything we say we will. We’re also working hard to reduce the number of escalations to stage 2 complaints by providing better quality stage 1 responses. Our dedicated team of complaints specialists are continuing to resolve issues fairly and are making sure you are kept informed at every stage of the process.
For more information on how we’re managing complaints and how your feedback is helping us improve, head to: thrivehomes.org.uk/tsm-complaints-performance
Prefer a printed copy? Contact us!
Who called me?
020 3148 7719
Our customer satisfaction research partner, IFF, may occasionally ring you on our behalf to ask a few questions about our services.
We take all feedback seriously, and this short call really helps us shape our services and provide you with a fair deal.
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Are you looking to move home?
Whether you need a larger or smaller home, or want to move to another part of the UK then mutual exchange could be right for you!
Mutual Exchange is often the quickest way of moving home as it works by finding another social housing tenant to swap homes with. This is ideal if you're looking to move into a new area or if you are low priority on the housing register.
As a Thrive Homes tenant, you can get free access to the UK's largest mutual exchange website at www.houseexchange.org.uk
All you'll need to do is:
- Fill out an application form
- Add ‘Thrive Homes’ into the landlord box
- Sit back while we verify you as a tenant!
For more information, visit: thrivehomes.org.uk/mutualexchange
We’re here to help
Winter can be a difficult time to manage your household budget as more costs are put towards energy in your home. If you’re struggling with money, please reach out.
We work with a number of organisations like Citizens Advice, Energy Support and Helping Hands to support you.
Find out more at: thrivehomes.org.uk/wellbeing
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Be waste aware
The local authority won’t collect rubbish from your bin store if it’s:
- left on the floor
- placed in the wrong bins
- or if the bin stores are overflowing.
Not only is this a health, safety and fire risk, but when this happens we must arrange rubbish clearances which comes at an extra cost to you.
Working together we can avoid this. Check out our tips for keeping bin stores clear:
www.thrivehomes.org.uk/bin-store
It is your responsibility to get rid of items you no longer want such as beds and sofas. You can donate old furniture to a charity such as British Heart Foundation or Emmaus. Find out how to recycle it at: www.recyclenow.com.
What should I do if someone is fly tipping?
Let us know as soon as possible.
It's helpful if you can share any evidence, including photos of the items that have been dumped, if there is a certain day or time you are noticing this happening and if you have any idea who may be responsible.
Contact us: thrivehomes.org.uk/contact-us
This is one of the ways we can make a positive contribution to your neighbourhood, an area where 48% of customers feel we could be doing more.
Damp and mould
Damp and mould can be harmful to your health and your home. If you find it in your home, we’ll work with you to sort it.
How to prevent damp, mould and condensation.
- Make sure your home is well aired
- Wipe windows and surfaces dry
- Use household mould cleaning products around your bath or seals of a window
- Avoid drying clothes indoors where possible
- Keep heating on low in all rooms throughout winter
- Let us know straight away if you find damp and mould in your home
For more advice, head to: thrivehomes.org.uk/damp-and-mould
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Happy Holidays from Thrive Homes!
Our offices will be closed from 12:30pm on Tuesday 24th December 2024 until 8am Thursday 2nd January 2025.
While we’re closed, you can still access our services via the myThrive hub:
- Self-repair guidance
- Make payments*
- Book repair appointments (houses)
- Report communal repairs (flats)
And much more!
Head to: thrivehomes.org.uk/mythrivehub
For emergency repairs call: 0800 917 6077
For anything else, email us on enquiries@thrivehomes.org.uk and we’ll respond as soon as possible once we’re back.
*Payments made whilst we are closed will be credited to your account by the end of the day on Thursday 2nd January 2025.