Teamtalk Issue 68 Issue 68 October 2015

www.ahintranet.org.uk/teamtalkEdition 68 - October 2015 We’ve won a 2015 UK Customer Experience Award! I felt immensely proud when I heard we’d won the 2015 UK Customer Experience Award for Best Small Contact Centre. These prestigious awards recognise the very best in Customer Experience across all sectors. To beat off national competition from the likes of Ticketmaster and LV= reflects what a truly amazing achievement this is. This is well deserved recognition for our Response Team! And, being one team, we can all share in the happiness of their success. Looking to the future We’ll be submitting our revised financial plan to the Homes and Communities Agency (HCA) by the end of October. All housing associations are required to submit new financial plans to show how they’ll manage the impact of the rent cuts up to 2021 (which were announced in the July budget). Here are the key features of our revised plan: „„ We’ll carry on building much needed homes, including rented homes that are affordable to households who are benefit dependent „„ We’ll convert a higher proportion of homes to affordable rents (though all our rents will be within Local Housing Allowance) „„ We’ll build a higher proportion of shared ownership homes (around half of our programme after 2018). This means we can maximise the overall number of homes we build „„ We’ll reduce our operating costs by looking at how we can deliver better value for money in our asset management spend. For example, we’ll save around £400k in Sussex by cutting out the middle man! We’re contracting directly with subcontractors and employing our own in-house contract manager and resident liaison officers. This enables us to deliver a better service at a lower cost „„ We’ll save money by reducing office costs and improving our online offer and mobile working. These measures will ensure AmicusHorizon is able to: „„ Continue delivering a great service for our customers „„ Help even more people become shared owners or rent a home „„ Remain in great financial shape to thrive and grow in the new operating environment.