Your voice
Learning from you
Whether it’s filling out a survey, attending one of our events, joining a customer workshop, being part of our online community or just giving us some feedback – we want to say a huge thank you to everyone who engaged with us in 2021-22.
The insight we gain from you helps us to improve our services and ensure our customers’ needs are at the heart of everything we do. For example, in 2021-22 we spoke to more than 1,500 customers about making our pet policy more customer-friendly and inclusive, and we reached out to every single Stonewater customer to find out what financial support they might need as we all deal with the rising cost of living.
Here’s a look at the other ways we’ve worked with you to drive change at Stonewater in 2021-22:
Communicating with you
In 2021-22, we’ve been increasing the amount of resources and guides that are available to you so that you have more information about the issues that are affecting you at home, and how we can help you with them.
These have included guides for damp, mould and condensation, anti-social behaviour, our energy hub and a guide to rents and service charges. We’ve also produced some video guides to help with issues such as heating your home properly as well as telling stories about the work we do in your community.
Our newsletter, Here to Help, is also produced quarterly to keep you up to date with what we’re doing about the big issues you’re telling us about, updates on how we’re supporting our customers in the community and information on our services.
Our Facebook Community Group has 1,700 members and counting, and is full of lots of really important and constructive feedback which helps us to understand what’s happening where you live.
Across our social media platforms, our customer communications team handled around 8,000 messages from customers, helping to answer your questions and put you in touch with the right people to help get your query resolved.
Online events
Throughout the year we have been hosting live events through Facebook and other online services, giving you the chance to find out more about us and some of our partners, and ask us questions about what we do for you.
The first session focussed on damp, mould and condensation and since then we have heled sessions on energy saving; career opportunities; showcasing our LGBTQ+ safe spaces; finding out more about involvement and complaint handling; meet the Housing Ombudsman and other meet the team events.
Scrutiny Panel
Our Scrutiny Panel have had a fantastic 2021-22, bouncing back from the setbacks caused by the pandemic to recruit new members, make progress on their reviews and start some exciting new projects.
The team has been busy helping us implement their recommendations for our repairs service, undertaken a review of contact and communication and made some changes to make themselves more accessible to customers.
The panel have also been through some rigorous training and development to sharpen their scrutiny skills and have taken part in 10 workshops to help shape important services and policies in 2021-22.
You can find out more about a great year for the Scrutiny Panel just here
Community Champions
We rolled out our all-new Community Champions scheme in 2021-22, helping us to understand more about what’s happening where you live.
Building on the excellent work of the Estate Champions, our team of 35 volunteer Community Champions have been able to work with us to identify issues, give us valuable feedback about grounds maintenance and cleaning services, signpost their neighbours to our services and find opportunities for us to improve areas.
They have also been instrumental in helping us to tackle issues such as fly-tipping and anti-social behaviour, letting us know what’s happening and working with us to take action.
“I feel that by doing the walkabout, I can highlight what needs doing as well as giving residents the assurance that things will get better.”
- Community Champion
“Myself living in the block take pleasure on making sure the area looks nice, people in the block or passing bye say how nice things look. I am happy to say that everyone in this block gets on very well and help each other when needed”
- Community Champion
Pet Policy
In 2021-22, we spoke to more than 1,500 customers to design a new policy around keeping pets at home. It was really important that we listened to as many views as possible to make sure that animal welfare and the happiness of everybody in our communities was at the top of the list of priorities.
In July 2021, we were delighted to launch the new policy which meant that they no longer would customers have to choose between their property or their pet anymore.
Thank you to everyone who worked with us to design the new policy. Take a look at this video to see what it means for Wendy to be able to have Scruffy at home
Inside Jobs – supporting low-paid home workers
In September 2021, we launched a research project in partnership with Demos to understand the impact of new ways of working, such as home working, on lower earners.
Since the pandemic many of us have been working from home with lots of benefits such as reduced commuting costs, increased flexibility and most significantly, better work/life balance.
New ways of working also offer massive opportunity as where you live becomes less of a deciding factor on the type of job you’re able to access. However, other challenges such as having enough space, having the right equipment, being able to access good enough Wi-Fi, increased energy costs, and having the required skills and training.
At Stonewater we want to be doing all we can to support customers in overcoming any barriers to accessing new types of work so that our customers can continue to thrive in an ever-changing world.
Take a look at this video, featuring some of our customers’ stories about working from home, that talks a bit more about the research.
We Are Digital
In this modern world there are so many benefits to being online. In 2021-22, we helped Stonewater customers to become confident online through our partnership with We Are Digital.
116 customers completed We Are Digital training sessions to help them to get comfortable doing useful online tasks such as setting up online banking, using email and making video calls to speak with family and friends.
The training helps boost participants’ confidence, opens them up to more job opportunities and manage their home and money more quickly and easily.
Here are some of the good results for the customers who completed We Are Digital training:
- 100% of learners felt more confident using tablets and smartphones
- 100% would recommend the training to friends or family
- 91 learners completed four or more hours of training
- 17% learners showed an interest in learning even more complicated skills
- 62% of learners felt more confident accessing online forms and Universal Credit
Elizabeth, 66, went on the training to help her use apps so she could stay in touch with her family in Thailand and even used her new skills to land a job as a Covid vaccinator with the NHS. She said: “I’m 66 and actually got a job. I’m the worst pupil and I feared it, but (the trainer) made me confident.” Following the training, Elizabeth is now using other apps to help her manage her day to day life, including her online banking.
Employability and volunteering
Throughout 2021-22 we have been working with our partners to create chances for people to learn new skills, change careers and get more involved in their community.
Through practical courses in construction skills, opportunities to progress in healthcare and helping to maintain Britain's supply chain by training people to become HGV drivers, we're proud to help people unlock their potential.