The Digital Transformation of Housing Associations

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17 Final word

3 Introduction

5 An industry overview

9 How Housing Associations across the UK are embracing digital

11 How digitisation can improve Housing Associations in other ways

13 Case study

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Introduction

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Digital isn’t just about transactions, conversions or increasing revenue, it’s about optimisation, operational efficiencies, streamlining processes, improving the customer journey and using data to make better decisions. More importantly, it is about differentiation and creating better customer experiences through digital.

Some Housing Associations are embracing this challenge and becoming more customer centred – they are mapping the customer experience, and they are innovating internally to create new products and services for their customers. In this ebook we’ve cited several examples of Housing Associations that are ahead of the curve on their digital journey.

All our customers want hyper convenience, the mobile devices our customers carry have made them more demanding. They expect a great experience, every time.

So, when that experience fails, or there is no experience, unless there is no option other than to deal with your brand, they end up moaning, normally on social media and, if they can, they’ll move to a competitor.

At ORM we are obsessed with how digital can simplify processes – bringing better convenience and a great experience to new products and services.

We believe Housing Associations are ready for disruption and change. Here in our latest ebook we’ve highlighted the benefits of introducing digital into their business models. We hope you enjoy reading. Please reach out and let us know if we can help your digital future.

Housing Associations, like any business, must adapt and change their business models, to accommodate their customers’ new behaviours and their expectations of how they want to interact with you.

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An industry overview

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Housing Associations face a challenging and competitive future; a shortage of housing supply, more stringent regulatory requirements for the estates they manage and reducing subsidies from government to bolster social housing incomes. This all means margins are being squeezed, whilst the needs and expectations of their increasingly digitally savvy residents are becoming ever more sophisticated.

As last year’s Housing Governance report, Grant Thornton outlines that this leaves many Associations with some stark choices: cancelling or postponing development plans, streamlining front-office functions, or changing loan repayment terms.

However, when it comes to digital adoption, many Housing Associations are behind the curve. Ad hoc growth and the merging of several legacy systems mean that technology being employed is often fragmented and processes laboured.

Customers still fill in paper application forms, the data from which is inputted into a siloed system before it is manually assessed for eligibility. Once on board, almost all of the contact between the HA and the customer is via telephone or email. In general, there is minimal use of digital technology in updating the status of queries or proactively communicating with customers.

Digital adoption rates are slow for a number reasons – constraints on budget, the internal structure of the organisation dominated by siloed departments, stakeholders clinging on to old ways of working and a general reluctance to embrace new technology are just some of the obstacles HAs are grappling with.

However, increasingly a more palatable route is being explored - the digitisation of key products and services to increase operational efficiency, as well as improving the experience of its customers.

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Yet, digital technologies are here, and Housing Association can’t ignore the turning tide. Today’s consumers also want better customer service from which ever brand, company or institution they are dealing with.

These same customers want companies to provide them with information in one click, which is fuelling the ‘one and done’ trend – i.e. people want to avoid time wasting and repeating tasks (such as answering the same questions in multiple forms).

In addition, in our fast-paced 24/7 world many customer transactions and complaints are taking place outside office hours, which is leading to a demand in self-serve options.

71%of customers surveyed said the most important thing a company can do for them is provide good customer service.

Research by Forrester

The Government’s own ‘Digital by Default’ campaign is spearheading a cost-saving drive across all its departments. It believes it will save £1.8billion a year by going digital.

In the recent Digital Efficiency report it found that transactions conducted online can be

This cost-saving initiative is forcing HAs to improve the efficiency in their operations too, so they can accommodate the Government’s mandatory rent freeze on social housing.

20x cheaper than by phone

30x cheaper than by post

50x cheaper than face-to-face

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An example of how digital tools improve efficiency can be found in re-evaluating the role of the Neighbourhood Housing Officer (NHO).

Currently, much of an NHO’s time is spent on non-customer facing activities and travelling between jobs. Only a small proportion of it is spent actively managing the assets and acquiring new tenants. The remainder is consumed in responsive activities.

Introducing digital technology can allow NHOs to log issues and incidents remotely, which will free them up to manage their own properties/estates and will allow them to be more customer facing.

Plus, digital can give them the flexibility of remote working, which will reduce their travel time at the same time as reducing the cost to the business (an example of this in action is cited below).

By digitising the customer journey, and allowing customers to self-serve online, HAs can reduce their ongoing operational costs and will enhance their customer experience.

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How Housing Associations across the UK are embracing digital

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Here are three examples of Housing Associations using digital to enhance the customer journey, reduce costs and improve efficiency.

Richmond Housing Partnership have developed an industry first fully digital housing solution. Easy to use digital self-serve is provided as a key aspect of the tenancy agreement and already 60% of all transactions are carried out online. This channel shift has led to improved customer satisfaction and a 40% reduction in the operational cost per unit.

Optivo have been on a transformation journey for four years and through efficiencies, now 35% of their tenants are signed up to online services and 10% of repairs are fully managed online. They’ve reduced calls to their CSC and have more and more home visits becoming self-service, driving cost reductions across the business.

Birmingham City Council has looked at its customer journey and identified how to direct people appropriately into online self-service. Its tenants now get a personalised digital log-book, as well as an individual tenant digital portal. As a result, 97% of tenants now complete forms online. Three quarters of prospective tenants self-serve by registering their details online. Birmingham CC has also managed to reduce rent arrears by £134k.

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How digitisation can improve Housing Associations in other ways

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Incorporating digital technologies into Housing Associations can have a positive impact on both the internal operations and the customer experience.

Here are some ways how:

Building Infrastructure Having a mobile, digitally enabled workforce reduces or removes the need for physical neighbourhood locations, reducing building costs.

NeighbourhoodsMobile, connected workers, dealing with those that need help the most and exceptions rather than transactions, enables the organisation to become ‘more human’.

Organisation and Process By removing paperwork and automating manual processes will free up resources for employees to undertake other work.

Service CentreHaving a mix of homeworkers and office based staff means HAs can manage a mixed/blend of channels (phone/email/chat/social media) and complex enquiries, or queries from customers who do not wish to self-serve.

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Case study: Why now is the right time for Moat to undergo digital transformation

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” Mark Rogers, Moat’s Director of Business Transformation

Housing Associations are now making the best use of digital technology to enhance their customer experience, improve internal processes and make efficiencies.

Yet, as Mark Rogers, Moat’s Director of Business Transformation admits, as an industry housing could look out of the sector more for ideas. This is a trend Rogers is hoping to buck.

Here, Rogers talks to ORM about Moat’s digital transformation, how it will improve its internal processes and open up new ways of working.

If you look at the websites and portals for most Housing Associations, they all look very similar. We want something a bit different. So, we’ve looked outside our sector and partnered with ORM to push the boundaries of what we can achieve.

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ORM: Where is Moat on its digital journey?

Mark Rogers: We are in the early stages of our digital transformation, but we’ve been doing a lot of ground work in terms of trying to make sure we’ve got the right infrastructure to support the changes we are keen to make. We’ve already implemented a new telephony system, which is integrated with our Microsoft Dynamics CRM, and now looking to further develop this. We are getting very excited about our new website and customer portal which we’re developing in partnership with ORM.

Our current website doesn’t meet our, or indeed our customers, needs and I think the focus on the user experience that ORM is bringing to the project will have a significant impact.

ORM: What do you want the new portal to do? How is it going to service your customers?

MR: We want to provide customers the ability to securely login and, where possible, easily access information, files and services, such as making payments, request repairs and to track progress on their requests.

ORM: How is your digital initiative going to benefit your operational/organisational structure?

MR: We are trying to make sure our digital transformation isn’t just about technology and that it’s about people too, improving how and where we work. It shouldn’t matter where staff are, they should be able to access everything they need from a digital device in order to provide the best service to our customers.

ORM: When did you start this journey, and what was your starting position?

MR: The first part of our digital transformation started with the introduction of our Microsoft Dynamics CRM. We’re now working on a version so staff can access that system on their mobile devices. We’ve held a number of workshops, with both customers and staff, to identify the different opportunities for incorporating digital into our work.

Some of that was about promoting opportunities that are already there. We’ve then reviewed and prioritised them in terms of what will make the most impact, what will save us the most time, what efficiencies we can save internally and how can we improve the customer experience.

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ORM: Can you give an example of how digital transformation will change the way you operate?

MR: A really good example of how digital will improve operations can be found in our letting process. There is a huge opportunity for improvement here. Currently it is a fairly manual and paper based system. We want to turn this into a digital process from start to finish, from application forms, organising appointments for customers, tenancy agreements, welcome packs, through to taking the first payment.

ORM: To what extent has the technology that your customers are using driven your need to transform?

MR: It has in a big way. For example the phone you have in your pocket is more advanced than the systems in most businesses. We’ve talked to thousands of customers to find out about how they would like us to engage with them and found that a large proportion of our customers have smartphones and their preferred methods are via text messaging, emails or the self-service portal.

ORM: What about those who don’t have access to this tech, how will you provide for them?

MR: For our customers who want to pick up the phone and talk to someone they will be still able to do so. We want to use technology to enhance our customer journeys and we want to do it in a way that it naturally becomes the preferred option for them.

ORM: What are the obstacles in trying to implement digital transformation, and how are you overcoming them?

MR: We haven’t faced any real obstacles yet, but it’s still early days. I would say that a potential obstacle is not bring your staff on the journey with you. Right from the very beginning we’ve made sure that we have clear two-way communication with staff and got the right people involved at the right time.

ORM: What advice would you give to others about to embark on their digital transformation journey?

MR: Digital transformation is not about having a start and end – it’s about continuous improvement and the focus shouldn’t always be about new technology. It’s about changing the way we work and making the organisation easier to do business with.

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Digital transformation is a significant enterprise for any organisation, but it will be critical in helping Housing Associations deal with what are deep industry-wide challenges. To succeed in the current environment it’s crucial that they develop business cases that prioritise digital products and services, which will maximise business impact and value.

Huge cost pressure within the industry means Housing Associations need to spend wisely. Therefore technology decisions should consider future initiatives and functionality, whilst building on platforms and systems that offer flexibility and scalability.

To ensure this, broad stakeholder engagement and buy-in from across the organisation is essential, from senior executives to technical experts and those working with residents in neighbourhoods themselves. Customer adoption is a key driver for the success of the business case.

Housing Associations should therefore put customers front and centre of experience design to ensure adoption. Digital products and services will only be used if they meet real needs and are easier to use than other options such as calling customer services.

The final word from ORM

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Come and talk to us about how we can kick start your digital future...

hello@ormlondon.com@ormlondon#OhArEm

Natasha BluntBusiness Development Directornatasha.blunt@ormlondon.comM +44 (0) 7715 057634

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