Voice feedback

Voice users helped us to better understand our customers view on the health and wellbeing services we provide. We asked core questions relating to:

• where customers access health and wellbeing support
• areas of interest in health and wellbeing
• how customers prefer to receive support
• awareness of and access to other community services offered by Grand Union

We had 199 responses in total, all proving us with some great insight.

We asked customers where they are more likely to go when accessing health and wellbeing services. Customers said they were most likely to use web searches, followed closely by GP surgery/hospital and local support groups/charity.

1. Web searches
2. GP surgery/hospital
3. Local support groups/charity
4. Local Council
5. Grand Union

We asked customers what areas of interest they have about improving the health and wellbeing of not only themselves but also their families. 57% want to improve weight/diet and followed closely by 56% wanting to improve low mood/anxiety. 53% were interested in help with long term health conditions.

The chart below shows what areas of interest customers have for improving health and wellbeing of themselves and their families.

Customers said that they would prefer to receive support by having a one-to-one conversation, in person (77%). 87% of respondents were not aware of any of the community services offered by Grand Union.

For our next survey we wanted to better understand what our customers want from a feedback page on the Grand Union website. We asked a few core questions relating to:

• experience of the existing feedback page
• what customers liked and disliked about the existing page
• reasons for customers not visiting the existing page
• what information our customers want to see from a feedback page

155 of you took part, and 69% of respondents had not previously visited the feedback page on our website, while 81% of those who hadn’t said it was because they were not aware of the page.

Respondents felt the existing page was easy to use and navigate, it was informative, straight forward and simple.

You also said:

• the feedback page needs to provide more detail about what has improved
• it needs more detail around repairs
• you would like to see information on call answering times

We asked customers to highlight the feedback areas they are interested in, and the most popular were lessons learned from complaints, repairs performance, customer satisfaction scores and TSMs.

There were some additional great suggestions around what else you’d like to see from the page.

Thanks for all this feedback. We’ve already started working on adding several of your suggestions to the page and hope to include many more over the coming months.

Voice users helped us to better understand the extent damp and mould issues are affecting our customers. We asked some core questions relating to:

• severity
• location of issues
• previous contact and planned resolution
• preferred communication method
• opportunity to provide contact details to Grand Union in order to find resolution
• steps customers are taking in order to help deal with damp and mould

We had 251 responses in total, all providing us with some great insight. More than half of respondents (59%) said that they have an issue with damp and mould, with 32% saying the issue was significant and impacting their life.

76 of the 146 customers who said they have an issue with damp and mould gave us their contact details, and contacted all of them to book in a visit to get the issues sorted.

The chart below shows which rooms were most likely to have a problem with mould:

Mould was most likely to be an issue in bathrooms (70%), followed by bedrooms (58%). With the issue occurring mainly on walls and ceilings.

Of those with a damp and mould issue, 68% have already reported it to Grand Union.

Customers said they were taking preventative measures and keeping their house and rooms well ventilated to try and prevent damp and mould. Other preventative measures highlighted include keeping heating on low, using extractor fans and wiping down windows.

We wanted to ensure that moving forward it is easy for our customers to contact us regarding damp and mould issues. We therefore asked which would be the preferred method of communication for damp and mould issues moving forward?

The chart below shows you’d prefer various channels of communication in order to meet your needs:

Whilst the survey has now closed, our work to fix damp and mould issues goes on. We continue to receive your contact through Voice which are passed to our customer contact team who are doing a great job of contacting customers and seeking a resolution.

Voice users helped us to better understand how MyGUHG works for our customers and identify potential problems. We asked some core questions relating to:

• what services customers are using
• the customer experience of those using MyGUHG
• what is preventing customers from using MyGUHG
• any other services customers would like to see on MyGUHG

We had 219 responses in total, all providing us with great insight. The majority (83%) have used MyGUHG, with 65% having used it in the last six months. Overall, 87% of those who had previously used MyGUHG said they would use it again. Of those who haven’t used it, 76% said they have not needed to contact Grand Union or they prefer to use the telephone.

The top five reasons customers said they have used MyGUHG were:

1. report a repair
2. check rent statements
3. check status of repair
4. pay rent
5. check repairs history

In terms of Customer experience, 68.5% of respondents said that MyGUHG is easy to use and 33.6% said they are more likely to get what they want if they use MyGUHG rather than the phone.

The graph below shows what percentage agree with the statements below.

There were some suggestions for improvements including:

• removing the SAM bot (which we have done)
• ability to log all repairs
• ability to log specific heating repairs
• more time blocks for all repairs

Overall, 13 respondents said that they had no improvement suggestions, with one stating ‘it is a great guide, helpful’.

We wanted to know more about how customers feel about us welcoming them to their new home, with some core questions around:

• What items are useful when moving in
• What information is useful when moving into a new home
• Any general comments around moving into a new property

You told us that the five most useful items were:

1. cleaning supplies
2. milk
3. a kettle
4. teabags
5. a voucher for a takeout

Mugs just missed out on fifth place. There were also some other great suggestions such as toilet rolls and bedding.

We also asked what information was important to know when you first move into your new home. You said the three most important were instructions on how to use your boiler, the stopcock location and how to log a repair.

We then gave you an opportunity to share any further comments about moving into your new home. The most popular response related to ensuring the condition of the property was suitable for a customer to move in to. You also highlighted that it wasn’t always necessary to remove everything from a property as some items, such as flooring, may be wanted by those moving in. Another popular subject was around having clear guidelines around repair and maintenance responsibilities.

Thank you for this feedback – we will be reviewing it with the relevant teams and using it to shape the service we provide.

Voice users helped us to understand your views on our current pet policy and pet ownership in Grand Union properties, with a few core questions relating to:

• Pet ownership amongst customers
• Areas of the policy you disagree with
• Anything you felt was missing from the policy
• Areas which may be unclear

We had 159 responses in total, all providing us with some great insight. The first thing we asked was around pet ownership, with 64% of all respondents confirming that they own a pet, whilst a further 25% are thinking about getting one. Of those who do currently own a pet, 63% have a dog and 50% have a cat. Beyond cats and dogs, you also told us you have rabbits, gerbils, fish, birds, a sprinkling of exotic pets and even the odd ferret.

The most common feeling amongst respondents was that we should consider pets being allowed in all properties due to the positive impact a pet can have on mental health wellbeing as well as the companionship they provide.

Several respondents highlighted that it was not a legislative requirement for a cat to have a collar and tag. Whilst others felt we could provide more clarification around how Grand Union manage and monitor compliance with the policy. We have reviewed the pet policy and have taken the views you shared on Voice into account.

Voice users said that they disagree with dogs not being allowed in flats. We have now changed the pet policy so that where possible, we allow one dog, one cat, one vivarium or a reasonable number of small pets in general needs flats. This does not apply to some properties where they are not suitable for some pets because they have no garden or a small communal garden, are looked after by managing agents as we may need to seek their permission, or you are a leaseholder (you will need to check the terms of your lease).

Voice users said that they disagreed with dogs not being allowed in sheltered housing. We will now consider requests from those living in retirement/sheltered housing. This will be restricted to one pet, unless there are exceptional circumstances for incoming customers. Decisions will be made on a case-by-case basis and will consider the customer’s ability to care for the pet and arrangements if the customer becomes unable to care for the pet, suitability of the property and the impact on other customers.

Voice users said that cats don’t always wear a collar, as this isn’t a legal requirement, and felt that cats wearing collars with names and addresses shouldn’t be a Grand Union requirement. This has now been removed from our pet policy.

Voice users also indicated that they felt they needed clarification on the policy wording in respect to how Grand Union will ensure customers are complying with the policy and how this will be enforced. We have now reworded the policy to make it clearer and easier to understand.

You can read more here.

We wanted to understand our customers’ views on the time blocks we provide for repairs.

We had 243 responses and found that 65% of customers said that the Monday to Friday 10-2pm time slot was their preferred time and Friday 8-10am was the least preferred with only 44% of customers preferring this time.

The graph below shows which time blocks within our current offering were preferred.

Customers also said if they were to choose a time slot we don’t currently offer they would prefer Saturday morning (60%) with the least popular being Sunday evening (31%).

The most common reason for each customer’s preferred time blocks was to fit around work commitments or childcare.

We wanted to understand how our customers prefer to communicate with us and their satisfaction with the channels on offer. There were 197 responses and we found:

Most customers said that they preferred to use the telephone for most reasons, with the exception of when paying rent or checking their account balance (where MyGUHG customer portal was the preferred method of communication).

Customers told us what channels they have used in the last 12 months, these were:

• Telephone (82%)
• MyGUHG customer portal (72%)
• Email (53%)

The graph below shows customers satisfaction with the communication channels they used.

Only 22% of customers said they were satisfied with their experience using the web bot. As a result the web bot has now been removed.

We wanted to understand whether our customers are getting the most out of our social media posts and to find out their views to help us to ensure what we post is relevant. We had 196 responses and we found:

• The most popular times for customers to check social media was between 5pm and Midnight (81%), Followed by 6am and 9am (44%)
• Of our customers who use social media, 65% don’t follow Grand Union on any platform.
• The main reason customers said they didn’t follow us was that they didn’t know Grand Union was active on social media.

The graph below shows what content customers said they were interested in seeing on Grand Union’s social media platforms.

We are using the feedback from this survey to shape the content we put on social media and ensure it is relevant and useful to our customers.

We wanted to understand how our customers feel about environmental issues, what matters to them and how our service should look like for customers, should their home be selected to have and energy efficient heating system installed. There were 174 responses and we found:

The issues that are most important to our customers are:

• Energy efficient homes (96%)
• Recycling (92%)
• Improving biodiversity, which is plant and animal life (86%)

The graph below shows what our customers currently do to be more environmentally friendly.

Our customers told us that after the installation off efficient energy systems, 91% would expect lower energy bills and 11% said they would expect this to reduce the impact of future energy increases.

Finally, our customers told us what they thought our installation process should look like. They said:

• They would like to be contacted via email (51%)
• They would like to be given between one and two weeks notice (39%)
• They would like to be given three and four weeks notice (32%)

We wanted to understand what our customers want from the Customer annual report so we can ensure it is designed to suit our customer’s needs. There were 129 responses.

Customers told us what they liked about our previous customer annual report.

• They liked to see how Grand Union is performing (55%)
• Customer stories (26%)
• Learning about the work Grand Union does in communities (26%)

Overall, nine customers commented that they didn’t like the overly positive content and that they would like to see more about areas to improve. Two customer comments also mentioned that they felt the report was too long.