Saxon Weald Use RentSense to Embed Efficiencies and Manage Growing Workload

Saxon Weald, a social landlord-based in Horsham, Sussex, invested in RentSense to mitigate welfare reform and deliver efficiencies.

“Our Housing Management System (HMS) was not presenting the right cases, making it harder for officers to identify the cases that needed action.” Explains Housing Operations Manager at Saxon Weald, Laura Anderson.

At that time full-service Universal Credit was being rolled out, and Saxon Weald were also keen to maintain their arrears performance.

“Selecting RentSense was also part of the bigger picture about investing in resources that would deliver efficiencies to help the organisation protect revenues and our most vulnerable customers. Our arrears are low, but there was concern these could escalate with Universal Credit.” Mentions Laura.

When discussing their investment in RentSense Laura highlights how it has helped them maintain low arrears despite now having around 1,000 Universal Credit cases.

Coloured terraced houses, Worthing

RentSense is really accurate in the arrears cases it presents, but it also flags cases earlier (than our HMS) and enables a more proactive approach to rent arrears and it has supported our ability to focus on low level arrears.
Laura Anderson, Saxon Weald

Helping Mitigate Covid-19

Since the outbreak of Coronavirus there has been a huge spike, over 2 million, in Universal Credit claimants in the UK. Like other social landlords Saxon Weald have been affected by this, as have many of their tenants.

“We have seen a sharp rise in Universal Credit claimants. RentSense has really helped, flagging these cases straight away so we can offer the support to tenants. The UC rules (in RentSense) help us manage these cases more effectively and ensure early intervention.”

With Covid-19 affecting how all organisations work and how social landlords deliver services to tenants Saxon Weald have found they have relied on the insight that RentSense gives management.

“The reporting tools have been really useful. It has enabled me to monitor the team performance throughout, so I can see how everyone is doing and how we are tracking against the workload. The fact you access RentSense from anywhere has also helped everyone make the transition to working from home.” Comments Laura.

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