Reflecting on the difficulties facing the housing sector this year, as well as the pressure on customers receiving benefits, Moat Homes licensed the Better Off Calculator as part of their ‘Better Off’ campaign. In just five months, they have successfully integrated the Calculator into their processes and received positive feedback from staff and customers.
Moat Homes’ good news story of 2022
Working with Policy in Practice has enabled us to create new ways to engage with our customers and empower our staff to support them at this difficult time.
Michelle Fitzgerald, Head of Income and Advice Services, Moat Homes
Learn more about Moat Homes’ good news story
2022 has been a challenging year across the sector. The reduction in the DHP budget at the start of the year has been particularly difficult for our officers trying to access support for our customers. One of our areas, Medway, was one of the first to have customers move across to Universal Credit as part of the managed migration programme. This caused additional challenges and increasing demands on our service. Combined with the increase in energy and food prices, this has only increased the difficulty for people on low incomes to budget and keep up with rent and service charge payments.
Policy in Practice has a number of tools available that our staff regularly access, such as webinars, articles and blogs for the most up to date useful information. As a result, we decided to work with them to introduce the Better Off Calculator as part of our ‘better off’ campaign. Most support or information we saw used words like ‘crisis’ or ‘hardship’ and we wanted to find a way to cut through the noise and negativity around the cost of living, and the phrase ‘better off’ was perfect.
We manage over 21,000 homes in the South East, so having a tool that is easy to use for all tech abilities is key. We have 15 staff using the Calculator since it was launched in August 2022. Our staff and customers really like the calculator and we have had a really positive response. We have now created a QR code to add to our letters and this will enable even more of our customers to easily access the calculator.