Longhurst Group has invested in Mobysoft’s Rentsense to help it mitigate the effects of welfare reform as well as create efficiencies to help it deal with the government-imposed one per cent rent cuts.
As part of a review across its whole organisation, Longhurst Group, comprising Friendship Care and Housing, Spire Homes and L&H Homes as well as a funding and development arm, is standardising its systems in an aim to improve services and provide consistency while demonstrating value for money. Spire Homes has been using Rentsense, a SaaS-based solution, since 2014 and has reduced arrears from around four per cent to less than three per cent.
Paul Manning, corporate income manager, Longhurst Group, said, “UK housing providers are facing many challenges, not least of which are a one per cent social rent cut each year for the next four years and the likely impacts of welfare reform.
“When Rentsense was introduced, Spire Homes’ income teams’ combined caseload was reduced by around 50 per cent, and this reduction gave staff more time to contact tenants in high-risk categories.”
Looking to the future, Longhurst Group was keen to mitigate the effects of welfare reform and in particular universal credit.
Manning said, “Rentsense supports our preparation for the rollout of universal credit, allowing us to be in the best possible place to deal with income recovery more effectively and prioritising the high risk cases.”
Darren Ryland, director of ICT, Longhurst Group, said, “The implementation process was straightforward when it was deployed at Spire Homes in 2014, so we are looking forward to the same being true later this year when Rentsense is deployed across the entire Longhurst Group.”
