Coronavirus: an update from us

The main change for our customers is that more conversations are taking place over the phone that might have been face-to-face before.

We know there will be lots of other changes for our customers in their daily lives, and it’s a really difficult time. We’re here to help, and our team are on standby to have conversations with any customers who are worried.

Now that we are coming out of lockdown we’re doing all we can to get back to ‘business as usual’ with repairs for customers.

Our call centre team are all working from home, to provide exactly the same service to our customers. They made this move really quickly, and there has been no reduction to service.

If you would like further information about Coronavirus, please visit the NHS website.

We know that everyone is finding the current situation difficult. There are lots of great organisations who can help. We’ve selected a few here:

Mind offers a range of support and advice on mental health. Call: 0300 123 3393 or visit the Mind website.

Samaritans offers Free, confidential support 24 hours a day, to those experiencing despair, distress or suicidal feelings. Call: 116 123 or visit the Samaritans website.

The government provides

• Guidance for the public on the mental health and wellbeing aspects of coronavirus (COVID-19) 
• Information on supporting children and young people’s mental health and wellbeing 

Let’s Talk Loneliness. If you are feeling lonely or isolated there are a number of organisations that you can talk to. You can find more information by visiting the Let's Talk Loneliness website.

We understand this is a really difficult situation for some of our customers. Our team are on standby to help you with this and make sure you get the support you need.

To help, we’ve introduced some new policies and advice. You might be able to pay less for a while. Although you will still have to pay the balance at a later date, we will set a sensible repayment agreement with you and you can be confident that this situation will not affect your tenancy with us.

Our Housing Managers are contacting customers directly to discuss what you need but they might not manage to reach everyone so don’t hesitate to call us.

If you need to speak to us more urgently, call our team on 0345 141 4663 so that we can discuss your circumstances and help put in place the things you need to lessen any concerns you have about paying your rent.

If you can’t pay your rent or service charge because you normally go out to pay it, and you’re currently in isolation, call the team on 0345 141 4663.

If you have any questions about benefits, please visit the government Help to Claim service.

We have a financial inclusion team who are on standby to help. If you are contacting our customer service centre and are concerned about this, you can be referred to this specialist team.

Now that we’re coming out of lockdown, we’re doing all we can to get back to ‘business as usual’ with repairs for customers. We’re working really closely with our contractor partners on recovery plans and we aim to be up and running to pre-covid levels by winter for customers. We’ve already started to complete non-emergency work where it’s been safe to do so. As we start doing more and more of these non-emergency jobs to get back to business as usual, we’ll be prioritising based on customer need, how long the repair has been logged for, and the nature of the work.

We’re following all Public Health and Health and Safety Executive guidance and best practice. That means we risk assess every repair job, and call ahead to do checks. When our repairs contractors enter our customers home they will follow social distancing rules. If you are a customer, you should make sure your home is well ventilated, provide somewhere for them to wash their hands, and make sure you reduce the touchpoints they need to have in your home (for example, you can open doors and cupboards for them). If you are unable to follow these steps, a contractor may need to wear a mask. If you can follow these steps, this isn’t necessarily required.

Yes, our customer service team is working as normal or you can report a repair on the website.

Our new policies and procedures about rent payments apply to shared ownership customers as well. Although you will still have to pay the balance at a later date, we will set a sensible repayment agreement with you.

If you are buying a shared ownership property and have concerns about payments, contact our team on 0800 073 0600.

If you already own a shared ownership property and are worried about your rent payments, you can contact our team on 0345 141 4663.

You don’t need to tell us, but you should self-isolate as the government advises. If you need an emergency repair, we will ask if you are self-isolating as part of any conversations before the repair is booked.

We are contacting all customers, starting with our more vulnerable customers. We are phoning everyone to check in on their welfare, and whether they need any help. If we can’t get in touch over the phone after 3 attempts, we are emailing and after that, we will follow our welfare check procedure.

As an organisation we are very aware of the potential impact of the current, challenging and continually changing situation with Covid-19 and the additional financial pressures being placed on all of our suppliers.

We want to assure you that we have robust and tested procedures in place that allow our Accounts Payable and key payments staff to work remotely. We use a web based purchase to pay system which gives us complete flexibility, our colleagues can log in remotely to receipt goods received, deal with any invoice holds, process and approve invoices and make payments.

We want to support all of our suppliers during these uncertain and unprecedented times. We will continue to meet our contractual payment arrangements.

Invoices for purchase orders

You should where possible use the iSupplier portal to submit your invoice, this will ensure that should there be any issues with the postal system or a reduction in capacity from our scanning partner, your invoice will not be impacted.

Invoices for non-purchase order payments

Please continue to submit your invoices directly to the existing postal and email addresses that you use now. Please be aware that any issues with mail deliveries could delay the processing of your invoice, if you currently submit invoices for payment using Royal Mail we would encourage you to liaise with your existing Home Group contacts to secure email addresses where you can send your invoices.

Our Accounts Payable team can be reached by calling 0300 131 0051 or by emailing accountspayable@homegroup.org.uk

In May the government shared this letter covering a range of topics including information on Mental Health and support for domestic abuse victims.

We carry out risk assessments to make sure our customers and colleagues are kept safe. What we learn when we carry out these assessments we use to improve the way we do things.

All our risk assessments are available to download as pdfs.