Our service standards

We want to put residents at the heart of all that we do. The services we provide need to be focused on the outcomes residents say they want - that's why we've produced new service standards that will allow us to show that we can deliver.

Top ten service standards

We launched our new service standards in October 2010. They were developed in consultation with residents and set out the level of service they can expect from us.

Residents chose their top ten service standards that they want us to report on every month on the website and in local offices and every quarter in Merlin Matters.

You can see our performance data against those standards for November 2011 and December 2011 below.

Standard	November 2011	December 2011	What are we doing to improve?
Acknowledge your written enquiry within five working days and respond within ten working days.			Unfortunately we were only able to respond to 71% of your written enquiries in time in December. We aim to respond to all of your enquiries on time and will work hard in order to do so in 2012.
Ensure that all of our communication to you is clear, easy to understand and free of jargon.	N/A		We continue to produce communications that are in plain English and that meet our agreed standard.
Listen to you and treat you with courtesy and respect at all times and respect your right to confidentiality.			All of the calls we monitored in December met the required standard and showed that our staff are courteous and respectful to our customers.
Offer you a repairs appointment when you contact us and keep you informed of any issues that may change this date.			We made appointments for most repairs jobs when you contacted us in December. We will continue to make appointments for as many repairs as possible and keep you informed of any changes.
Complete your repairs within the published timescale, confirmation the priority and the target time for completion when you contact us			We continue to complete most of your repairs in the time we say we will. Only 11 repairs were not completed in time in December.
Support you through any improvement works to your home, ensure the work meets your needs and give you a choice of fittings/colours where possible.			We work hard to liaise with our residents before, during and after any improvement works, giving you as many choices as possible. 96% of residents who had improvement works in December agreed with this.
Display local performance information in each area office.			The service standards are displayed on the TV screens in each area office. They are also published in each issue of Merlin Matters.
Invite you to join a walkabout in your neighbourhood at least every three months and advise you of any actions taken following the walkabout.			Neighbourhood walkabouts were last held in December. Walkabouts are now on hold while a review into how we conduct them is carried out. Please speak to your housing officer for more details.
We will contact you about anti-social behaviour in one working day for urgent cases and five working days for all other cases. We'll agree an action plan and keep you informed.			We have made big improvements in this area and in December we made contact in 78% of cases on time. There is still work to be done though to ensure you are contacted when we say we will.
Complete repairs in one visit or make a follow up appointment whist still in your property.			We aim to complete your repairs in one visit, but if that's not possible, we will arrange a convenient time to come back. In December we had to go back to just 16 job out of nearly 2,000.

Our service standards have been produced in line with the Tenant Services Authority's standards and in association with our residents. At a well-attended workshop residents revised the standards to produce a smaller number that covered the issues they said really mattered to them.

Copies of our service standards are available here to download or you can contact your area housing office to request them.