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The Challenges Faced by Housing Associations in 2023

These are difficult times for Housing Associations. They are challenged to meet the Tenant Satisfaction Measures posed by government compliance targets while facing spiralling costs out of sync with increased rental opportunities. Social Housing contact centres are burdened by bad press highlighting the lows of the industry while striving to modernise customer interactions and implement operating efficiencies.

These challenges can be met and targets exceeded if the organisations have the technology tools in place to support the staff and management team in the Housing Association.

Ciptex recognises the challenges housing associations face in meeting government compliance targets while striving to modernise customer interactions and implement operating efficiencies.

Learn how Aster overcome challenges

Attendees at the Social Housing Strategy Forum were interviewed:

UK Housing Associations recognise that Technology can help

Top Strategic Priority

26%

Modernising service delivery models

Top Technology Priority

27%

Omnichannel engagement model

Highest Priority

48%

Digital Change to the Contact Centre

Four Highlighted Challenges

Let’s consider these challenges in delivering excellent customer service:

Communication barriers

Housing organisations often support customers with various backgrounds, cultures, and preferred communication channels. While some tenants may be at ease communicating via digital channels, others may prefer to communicate via phone or face-to-face, so organisations must manage these different communication preferences.

Resource constraints

Housing organisations face various budget constraints that may result in limited resources and staff capacities, and this is in a time of high-volume call traffic and increasing service level expectations. A communication breakdown can result in time wasted in maintenance staff being unable to access an empty property, and queue times for incoming calls can frustrate customers.

Complex regulations

Not meeting the regulator’s targets for customer experience, data security, privacy compliance, and tenancy laws can severely impact an organisation’s ability to meet funding requirements. The regulations can be challenging to interpret and difficult to apply consistently when managing a varied customer base, often with vulnerable groups and special needs.

Managing expectations

Tenants may have high and sometimes unrealistic expectations about the level of service that they are entitled to. This can be exacerbated when demands go beyond the capability of the housing associations, despite their best efforts.

Ciptex believes that technology adoption to support modern tenant customers’ communication and engagement needs is the path that innovative Housing Associations must take.

Ciptex have the Technology experts to help face the challenges

While technology can help improve customer engagement, it needs to be integrated with existing systems, and necessary skills will need to be trained among agents and supervisors for solutions to be successful.

At Ciptex, we have world-class experts able to implement the Twilio Flex Customer Engagement platform. We have a pedigree of integrating to multiple Housing Association Contact Centres and integrating CRM platforms.

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The Benefits of a Tenant-Centric Multichannel Call Centre

A multichannel digital approach using a cloud-based Housing Association contact centre offers many benefits for Social Housing organisations looking to comply with government legislation.

By providing a variety of communication channels, such as phone, email, web chat, and social media messaging, residents can easily contact their housing provider on their preferred channel.

This approach offers increased accessibility and transparency, improving customer satisfaction and retention. Additionally, a cloud-based social housing omnichannel solution enables secure, compliant data storage and monitoring, ensuring that sensitive resident information is protected.

Using a multichannel approach, social housing organisations can meet government regulations, improve customer service, and streamline operations.

Top five benefits of a Tenant Centric Customer Communication Platform

Improved customer service

Customers can contact the maintenance operation through their preferred communication channel, leading to increased accessibility and customer satisfaction.

Increased efficiency

Digital solutions enable faster resolution times and reduce the need for customer follow-ups, freeing up staff to focus on other essential tasks.

Reduced costs

Digital solutions can reduce the cost of staffing and physical office spaces and cut down on paper usage and storage costs.

Better insights

Supervisors can analyse data and customer interactions recorded through digital channels to understand customers’ needs and preferences better.

Enhanced collaboration

Digital channels allow maintenance staff to more easily collaborate with customers and colleagues, increasing productivity and improving problem-solving abilities.

friendly contractor in a social housing apartment block arriving from a booked appointment through the social housing omni-channel contact centre.

Cloud-based Contact Centres for Housing Associations

Ciptex recognises the challenges housing associations face in meeting government compliance targets while striving to modernise customer interactions and implement operating efficiencies.

Ciptex proposes that technology adoption to support tenants’ communication and engagement needs is the path innovative Housing Associations must take. Employing a multichannel digital approach using a cloud-based contact centre offers greater accessibility, transparency, and collaboration, leading to improved customer satisfaction and retention. Additionally, vulnerable customers can benefit greatly from a digital-first multichannel contact centre by offering personalised and accessible support. A cloud contact centre can also improve agent efficiency and job satisfaction by providing easy access to essential customer data, promoting work-life balance, streamlining processes, increasing collaboration, and providing advanced analytics.

Discover more through our blog

Find a deeper dive into:

How Vulnerable Customers can be helped with a Social Housing Omnichannel Solution
How Technology can help with Tenant Satisfaction Measures
How to improve Contact Centre Agent Job Satisfaction

Tenant-Centric Contact Centre

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Housing Association Contact Centre Solutions