The Council were looking at changing the way its council houses that were managed by Six Town Housing were ran in the future. They organised an independent review and considered 4 options:
- To stay as it currently was
- A hybrid model with the council appointing senior executives.
- Returning Six Town to Council control
- For Six Town to become completely independent of the Council.
After the review the best option was to return the council houses back under the direct management of the Council. They wanted the tenants and leaseholders to provide their opinion before a final decision was made.
The Project/Challenge
Ballot packs were sent to 7,792 tenants and leaseholders to allow their opinion to be considered before any final decision was made. The Council wanted to give tenants the opportunity to send back their opinion via post or have their say online.
The ‘Test of opinion’ needed to be undertaken in conjunction with 2 in person and 3 online local events where tenants had the ability to ask question directly on the subject. The postal pack needed to include supporting information regarding the proposal. The timescale for the opinion submissions would be 1 month.
Solution:
UK Engage worked with Bury Council to prepare the ballot packs, to include a reply paid, pre-addressed reply envelope and a 4-page supporting information document, which were posted to tenants and leaseholders. The ballot pack included details of how tenants could go online and make their submissions instead of sending back a postal reply.
The client had access to a digital dashboard showing them the turnout figures during the opinion period, with UK Engage providing a result service to inform the team which tenants had voted to allow any follow up activity. UK Engage also sent the client interim results weekly. The count was also undertaken by UK Engage and the results passed to the Council the next working day after the opinion time period had closed. There were 6 questions all with a Y or N response.
Results
There were 6 questions on the ballot paper with options for a Y or N answer with 771 responses from Tenants and Leaseholders received. UK Engage checked to ensure there was no double voting with the postal and digital submissions. There were 6 spoilt ballot papers received. There were 299 requests for further information about the proposals or asking for ways to get involved. The results were passed to the Council the next working day after the opinion period had closed by our returning officer Craig Poyser. The results of the 6 questions were provided separately for Tenants and Leaseholders.
UK Engage Customer Satisfaction
100%
of respondents would give a recommendation
100%
said they would use our services again
100%
said we were an improvement or the same as other suppliers
100%
overall impression of customer experience
100%
our account managers scored 100% for their project management support
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