Automating outbound contact in the rent collection process

Automating outbound contact in the rent collection process. Chris Roberts Head of Customer Service Centre Home Group LTD

Introduction Home Group, a social enterprise and a charity with a turnover of over £ 325 m, is one of the UK’s largest providers of high quality housing and supported housing services and products. Home Group's role is to provide general needs housing, supported housing services, and home ownership options targeted towards helping some of society’s most vulnerable people take control of their own lives: Home Group houses over 120, 000 people a year, managing 55, 000 homes in over 200 local authority areas in England, Scotland Wales. Each year this includes working with almost 30, 000 vulnerable people through 500+ supported housing, justice and health services

Why change was important?

Effort to manage arrears • 34 FTE working arrears • 25% of customers successfully contacted • 140 k spent on letters following failed contact • Generic approach for every customer

Cost vs. Effort ?

Call 2 Collect Process Arrears identified (report produced) Report sent to Call 2 Collect for customer contact via voice and SMS Customer receives voice message and requests to speak with a CSA undertakes arrears conversation with the customer Calls are sent daily, if no contact made SMS and letters sent at the end of the week.

Automation v Manual Automation FTE Required 2237 accounts 5096 contact attempts made 1865 Customer Conversations Manual To deliver 1865 customer conversations more resource and effort would be required within a manual outbound process. 4. 3 FTE Required 17. 3

Benefits Increased customer contact rates 34 FTE prior to automation Increased payments Increased Arrangements Set Reduced volume of arrears cases Customer complaints increased 27 FTE following automation

Customer Feedback “She understood me; she gave me all the information I needed” “Stopped me from worrying” Customer verbatim collected via Bright Surveys has highlight the most frequent words used following the immediate automated contact.

Tailored Approach vs One size fits all

Next Steps Understanding customers’ channel preferences, experience and level of satisfaction Understanding customer experience what works well/ not so well? Is there a case to move additional work?

Questions