Improved customer journey at mhs homes
Housing
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Results & ROI
- A total of £176,000 savings identified, made up of direct cash savings and a total of 4,000 hours of resource time saving
- Within the same financial year of the review, a total of £157,000 has been realised
- A significant reduction in subcontractor spend through an increase of in-house capacity
The client
mhs homes is one of the largest housing providers in Kent providing services to approximately 20,000 customers. Formed in 1990, it now owns and manages more than 8000 homes in Medway, Maidstone and Gravesham. They are Kent’s largest independent landlord supplying affordable homes for rent and shared ownership.
The challenge
A key department with large expenditure for mhs homes is its repairs service. Having completed an organisation-wide diagnostic, Ad Esse identified repairs as one of the key areas for review, recognising not only the impact service delivery has for customers, but also the opportunity to drive down costs, remove waste and improve efficiencies. Controlling cost whilst maintaining quality for a repairs service are major challenges for any landlord. In addition, repairs are one of the most common reasons for customer contact. mhs homes agreed to review the repairs service with objectives of reducing failure demand, realising cost savings, reducing waste activity, increasing the percentage of repairs completed in one visit and reducing the time it takes to complete a repair.
The approach
The review consisted of a diagnostic of the current state followed by redesign and implementation.
Diagnostic
Diagnostic activity, including Value Stream Mapping, Day In the Life Of and a demand analysis, enabled us to understand the process from end-to-end. Key findings included 42% of repairs calls into the Customer Service Centre were failure demand, errors being made in diagnosing of repairs, a lack of standardisation, targets driving the wrong behaviours and a lack of control in parts of the process.
Redesign
Key changes included removal of priority codes, removal of targets, instead re-orientating to measures, a complete review of the Schedule of Rates (SORs), an improved follow-on process and assisting with the development of subcontractor management.
The benefits
Additional to the financial savings, implementation of the new process has improved clarity of roles and responsibilities, increased the level of standardisation, embedded measures focused on improving the service, increased capacity within the labour force and reduced the number of errors. The Customer Service Centre quickly saw a 20% fall in failure demand calls and there was an 83% reduction of enquiries going to the Planning Team. More clarity on out-of-hours jobs saw a 35% reduction in the number of jobs inappropriately completed out of hours.
It has been refreshing to be given the opportunity to see the process in this way, but more importantly to have input on improvement.”
Repairs Operative