Issue - meetings

Matter for Decision

The Officer’s report provided details of works delivered and performance achieved in the first year of the housing planned maintenance contract that started in July 2011.

Decision of Executive Councillor for Housing

This report was for information only.

Reason for the Decision

Not applicable.

Any Alternative Options Considered and Rejected

Not applicable.

Scrutiny Considerations

The Committee received a report from the Principal Surveyor regarding the Housing Planned Maintenance Contract Progress Report.

The Principal Surveyor updated his report to amend a typographical error. Text in the table in paragraph 5 should state “134 Kitchens Bathrooms installed”.

In response to the report the Committee expressed concern that tenant satisfaction figures did not reflect comments made to Tenant and Leaseholder Representatives. It was suggested that comments would be more objective if the Resident Liaison Officer (RLO) was seen as independent, instead of affiliated to a contractor.

In response to Members’ questions the Head of Estates & Facilities, Asset Manager plus Principal Surveyor confirmed the following:

(i)                Customer satisfaction data was collected by a RLO. A surveyor would check work tasks were completed then the contractor’s RLO would invite feedback from tenants. Feedback forms were completed by tenants.

(ii)              If tenants had concerns regarding contractor’s work, these could be raised with Council Officers.

(iii)            Officers looked at overall trend information in feedback forms. There was no specific cut off point between satisfied and unsatisfied scores. Tenants were asked to mark their views on a scale of one to ten, one being unsatisfied and ten being satisfied.

(iv)            The Director of Customer & Community Services said Officers would undertake to review the methodology of tenant satisfaction data collection and report back to HMB. This would include initial satisfaction surveys, and any follow up feedback in case issues arose some time after work had been completed.

(v)              Apollo’s contractual costs exceed predicted costs by 10%. The Council would claw back the majority of this.

(vi)            No void properties were subject to sulphate issues in the reporting year covered by the Principal Surveyor’s progress report. The Council preferred to undertake remedial work for sulphate issues on void properties, but would undertake work on occupied properties too if required. Sulphate issues were scrutinised as part of the assessment criteria when the Council acquired new properties.

(vii)          Apollo had not met all of its contractual obligations regarding waste management and adding social value (work placements), as work had started late (mainly undertaken in the second half of this reporting year). This was due to staff TUPE condition issues. The Council was monitoring the situation.

(viii)        The Council had a supply chain link to contractors to select best value products to address its maintenance needs. The Council could not specify individual branded products to use, but specify standards/requirements it expected products to satisfy. Officer’s have extensive contract specification writing expertise. The Council has a seven year cyclical programme to cover all maintenance issues, instead of subdividing these into fencing, boilers etc.

(ix)            It was part of the Council’s role to monitor contractor’s health and safety practices. Officers would raise any issues they witness (eg through unannounced visits) with contractors.

(x)              The Principal Surveyor undertook to liaise with Councillor Blencowe post HMB regarding construction skills certification scheme card requirements.

(xi)            Tenant handbooks could be updated to list property specifications in future.

The Committee noted the report, but were not required to endorse any recommendations.

Conflicts of Interest Declared by the Executive Councillor (and any Dispensations Granted)

Not applicable.