Peabody statement on services and charges
Everyone has the right to live in a decent, safe, comfortable home and our job is to put things right when they go wrong and learn from our mistakes.
Published: 17/03/2023
Everyone has the right to live in a decent, safe, comfortable home and our job is to put things right when they go wrong and learn from our mistakes.
Our teams are working with the residents to resolve outstanding issues, and we are sorry in the cases where things have gone wrong.
We know there is room for improvement and our aim is to never give anyone cause to complain. We do not make a profit on service charges and do all we can to ensure they are accurate and reasonable.
Errors and inconsistences are incredibly frustrating for residents, and we know that improvements need to be made to both the way they are collected and in how we deal with and answer queries about them.
We're reviewing how we set and collect service charges and have formed a task force to deal specifically with service charge queries. We have also created new roles to boost our resources in this area.
We are working to improve overall services for residents at a more local level and prioritising investment in our existing homes. We support action to encourage and make it easier for residents to raise issues with us.
We are listening, and ensuring we identify every opportunity to make things right, learn lessons and improve our services. Service charges
Following feedback from our Resident Scrutiny Panel, we have made a series of improvements to the way we manage service charges:
- Being accurate is our priority and this has sometimes meant we have sent residents things late.
- We are committed to providing services that are good quality and good value for money, with service charges that accurately reflect day-to-day running costs
- The involvement of external managing agents (EMAs) (used when Peabody is not the freeholder) can complicate an already complex system
- Depending on lease and set-up agreements, EMAs may manage and control all the communal repairs and maintenance of a development. They also set management fees. This means service charges can vary substantially between developments
- Sometimes EMAs do not finalise and issue their year-end accounts on time, meaning we must use their most recent information to issue our own annual charges
- We advocate on behalf of our customers to ensure EMA charges are calculated accurately and transparently and any queries are properly investigated
- We analyse budgets received from EMAs and challenge them where necessary