Reporting a repair

Property maintenance forum for council housing in Central Bedfordshire

What is the property maintenance forum?

We set up the property maintenance forum to provide an opportunity for tenants (and leaseholders) to get involved and have a real influence over the repairs and maintenance service we offer.

Its role is to:

  • reflect the best interests of our residents regarding the operational delivery of repairs and cyclical maintenance – repairs is a big contract and defines what works are done at your home, how often and with what types of parts
  • let us know how we’re doing by reviewing the performance of maintenance contractors (are we providing you with a good service?)
  • give you a chance to investigate individual areas of our repairs service as identified by feedback and performance information-we need to understand your feedback; your aspirations and priorities are central to improving the service
  • provide a hands-on approach – do you want inspect completed works (such as voids) and feedback from a resident's perspective?

Why do we need you?

  • you're our customer
  • you pay for the service
  • you are the best person to tell us how we are doing

What role can you do?

Membership of the meeting is open to all residents who express an interest in the improvement of the repairs and maintenance service. We need:

  • chairperson – control and pace the meeting, ensure the meetings run time to time, enforce terms of reference, makes sure that everyone has their say
  • resident members – prepare for the meeting, keep an open mind, listen to the opinion of others, participate, take agreed action and brief others as appropriate
  • remote resident member – have your say using technology, physical attendance not required, submit questions online for discussion
  • resident inspectors – check the quality of the work, site visits, listen to repair calls, resident inspectors can choose to not attend the meetings and have their ‘findings’ of their inspection presented on their behalf

Get involved

Procedure

  • meetings will be held monthly
  • the subjects of each meeting will be advertised quarterly in advance
  • members can decide which meeting they would like to attend (attendance for every meeting is not mandatory)
  • members can request a contractor to attend a future meeting to discuss a specific issue or cause of concern
  • refreshments will be provided