While we’re still at a relatively early stage in our digital journey compared to some organisations, we’re really seeing the benefits to our business. And more importantly, those customers who prefer online self-service are really taking advantage of the small but growing number of options we offer.
Currently our website is host to several separate online tools:
- MyAccount is the first online self-service tool we introduced. This is an off-the-shelf system used by many housing associations and that allows customers to check and pay their rent as well as report repairs needed to their home. It’s well established and liked by many customers. We currently get 200-300 repairs a month reported through it.
- Our repairs checker is a simple tool that quickly allows customers to check the status of a booked repairs. It’s fully automated and is useful if you’ve forgotten the time and date of an appointment or to check on progress.
- The Help-Hub is a simple database of some of the issues and questions that customers contact us about the most. It’s based on the same advice system used by our own teams so it’s reliable and up-to-date.
- Online chat provides an alternative way of ‘speaking’ with our customer contact centre if you don’t want to make a voice call.
Our plan is to both make more services available online in this way and to help bring them together into a ‘one stop shop’ portal where you can deal with lots of issues and requests all in the same place. This won’t replace the option to use more traditional contact routes such as the phone - it’s more about offering choice and flexibility.
The new corporate plan, CP24+, has a clear focus on digital developments and our team are busy working on a new strategy to help make our vision a reality. So if you have ideas for what you’d like to see as online self-service options at Futures, or have some good examples of what other organisations are doing this area, drop us a line at digital@futureshg.co.uk.
