In January 2025 we received a C3 grade, which means the regulator has said our service is ‘in need of significant improvement’. The grading is not unexpected and we have had a work plan in place for some time to address areas that have been identified as in need of change.
We’ve put together this helpful information sheet for staff and residents to explain more about our regulatory judgement.
The Regulator of Social Housing sets out the standards that landlords must legally deliver under the Housing and Regeneration Act 2008. Consumer standards apply to all landlords including local authorities. These were revised in February 2024 with changes coming into effect from 1st April 2024. New expectations include having a stock condition survey for every individual property and detailed information about our residents so that we can best understand individual needs. The Fire Safety Act 2021 and Building Safety Act 2022 and related guidance published in 2024 also brought in more expectations for landlords.
To make sure the consumer standards are met, the Regulator has a rolling four-year programme of inspections. All social housing landlords with over 1000 homes will be inspected once every four years (starting in April 2024) to make sure they are meeting the standards, it’s like an OFSTED inspection in schools, and we take it very seriously.
Landlords are also required to submit data returns including a quarterly Fire Safety Remediation Survey and annual Tenant Satisfaction Measures. The regulator works with landlords to address any issues identified. Landlords are required to self-refer if they have concerns about whether they meet the required standards.
Regulatory judgements are published to show how well a landlord is delivering the required outcomes of the Regulator of Social Housing standards. They provide a consumer grading from C1 to C4.
The four consumer grades mean:
C1 : Landlord is delivering the outcomes of the consumer standards. The landlord has demonstrated that it identifies when issues occur and puts plans in place to remedy and minimise recurrence.
C2: There are some weaknesses in the landlord delivering the outcomes of the consumer standards and improvement is needed.
C3: There are serious failings in the landlord delivering the outcomes of the consumer standards and significant improvement is needed.
C4: There are very serious failings in the landlord delivering the outcomes of the consumer standards. The landlord must make fundamental changes so that improved outcomes are delivered.
We have been given a C3 grade in relation to the Safety and Quality Standard based on our data returns and the issues we identified through our self-assessment and self-referral to the Regulator in September 2024.
Since the introduction of new legislation and revised housing standards, action has been taken to revise our service to ensure that we meet the expectations set down across all areas, including compliance and building safety.
The regulator has found areas where we do not hold data in the required way to evidence compliance in areas relating to our stock condition and our emergency repair response times. They have also flagged the frequency of our electrical safety testing and have concerns about our outstanding fire remediation actions.
View the judgement on the GOV.UK website.
We believe that our homes overall are safe and in a reasonable condition and that we deliver strong services to residents and hold a range of data about our homes that we use to inform risk assessments and decisions. However, we don’t have data on the standard of all our homes, and this is required by the regulator.
What actions are you taking following the regulatory judgement?
We have an on-going work plan and provide regular updates though our Housing and Tackling Homelessness portfolio meetings. This includes completing stock condition surveys for all our homes; completing tenancy update visits; reviewing the way we hold and use information and re-prioritising capital investment towards fire safety. We also have improvement plans being actioned in areas that we flagged on our self-assessment in relation to other consumer standards where we want to see better outcomes for residents, for example our response to anti-social behaviour and complaints management.
You can read more about the work that we have been doing in a February 2024 report and September 2024 report.
All our properties are affected by our decision to self-refer. We are talking to the regulator about the whole service, not individual properties. Overall, we believe our homes are safe and in reasonable condition. We know that there may be issues with the condition of some of our homes which a tenant has not raised with us, and we have safeguards in place to identify these properties and support residents. The emphasis is that we do not have the data to be able to demonstrate to the regulator that all our homes are of an acceptable standard and that our practices meet expectation.
This a survey where we look at the standard of each of our properties and consider whether they are safe and whether there are unreported issues. We also think about the structure and fittings to see whether we need to invest. Lots of social housing landlords use stock condition surveys to plan works such as replacement kitchens and bathrooms as these are done on a schedule. However, we currently largely identify these planned works through repair requests and visits and are more responsive.
Information that we gather from stock condition surveys informs our Decent Homes calculation which is submitted to the regulator. Historically landlords could make assumptions that properties in blocks of flats, or the same build type and age, however there is now an expectation of inspections at an individual property level. We have lots of other data about our properties, for example, the age of the kitchen installation and energy performance information which informs our decisions. Through day-to-day repairs, gas and electric checks, planned schemes and tenancy update visits, we have been in every home in the last five years. We have systems in place for anyone visiting our homes to raise concerns about property condition.
We have a stock condition survey team and are visiting properties, prioritising those that haven’t got a survey on file, and those who live in our tall buildings where the survey is older than five years.
The expectation for social housing landlords is that they must keep electrical installations in repair and ensure that homes are free from ‘Category 1’ electrical hazards (as defined by the Housing Health and Safety Rating System (HHSRS)).
The regulator expectation is for an EICR to be completed regularly, with five yearly stock condition surveys and HHSRS assessments reinforcing confidence. We moved from a ten-year testing cycle to a five-year testing cycle in January 2024 and are progressing well, however it will take time to move all EICRs to having been completed in the previous five-year period. We undertake visual inspections annually and respond to reported issues.
The regulator expects remedial electrical safety actions to be recorded and reported on to aid management oversight and future planning. We are confident that we undertake necessary remediation actions but will need to review how we capture the information to demonstrate compliance to the regulator.
The Fire Safety Act 2021 and Building Safety Act 2022 have impacted practice in this area with increased expectations.
The number of fire safety actions that need completing is informed by Fire Risk Assessments which are completed on different properties on a rolling cycle, therefore the number of actions will never reduce to zero. We have processes in place to undertake the actions identified but many require significant investment and will need to be planned for.
We have risk assessed and prioritised our outstanding actions and have robust mitigation in place to protect tenants – for example, where a fire door has been identified for upgrade – the existing door will be a fire door and will have met the safety standards required at the time it was installed. The doors are repaired, serviced and checked regularly with leaflets for residents on how to check their fire door themselves and where to flag any concerns. The zero-tolerance policy (not keeping personal items in communal spaces) across our communal areas is a further example of a mitigating action to keep people as safe as possible whilst remediation work is undertaken. Some examples of low-risk actions are replacing posters and removing personal items and these are done by the estates and housing office teams with an action sheet passing to them weekly. We have a data issue where some of these low-risk actions have been completed but not recorded as closed.
We have already informed residents that we need to re-prioritise our capital improvement programme to prioritise fire safety works and there is a plan for heavy investment in this area, partially funded through rents, and partially through government grants, however we have budget pressures which means that this will take time and there will need to be decisions made on other areas of service delivery to find savings.
This mainly relates to the way that we capture information on our computer systems which means that it is harder to analyse repair response times for different repair types, and the fact that we operate our repairs service in a different way to most providers. We have developed a repairs performance dashboard and are taking steps to categorise repairs by type on our system, rather than putting multiple jobs relating to the initial repair request (at which point we ask if there is anything else that needs doing whilst we’re there and add it to the original job) on one record.
Also, when we were talking to the regulator our emergency repairs completed within 24 hours had dropped to 91% and it should be closer to 100%. Our quarterly reporting for Sep-Dec24 shows that this has increased back up to 99%.
The regulator has reviewed what we have done, what we are doing, and will work with us to improve the service we provide. It can also require us to take specific action if it decides it is necessary. The additional scrutiny of our work will help us to improve the service for our tenants and leaseholders, by providing an outside view of what needs to be done most urgently. We welcome this open and transparent assessment of our service.
We will be meeting the regulator each month to discuss our on-going work plan. They will inspect us at some point in the next four years.
Your wellbeing remains our priority, and we are dedicated to making sure you have a safe and comfortable home.
If you need to report a repair or concern about your property, continue to contact the repairs support team:
For out of office hours emergencies, call 023 9282 4244
The regulator looks to see whether there is evidence of systemic or organisational failure by the council, (a failure which is indicative of a wider breakdown in the provider’s overall organisation and systems). The regulator has no role in resolving individual disputes between landlords and tenants. If there is any information which you would think is important to share with the regulator, please contact them on:
