Housing Options Officer

How you’ll make a difference As a member of the HomeChoice management team, you will play a key role in co-ordinating and managing the provision of housing advice and homelessness prevention services. The HomeChoice service provides a high quality, comprehensive housing access service for households who are homeless or threatened with homelessness. Good housing can help to stabilise communities, reduce inequalities, improve safety and help reduce crime. What will you be doing? Daily, you will manage the team responsible for offering support to households, ensuring advice is in line with statutory homeless legislation. It will be your responsibility to monitor operational quality assurance standards in decisions relating to housing assessments and homelessness. You will need to correctly respond to requests for reviews, information and enquiries from members of the public, in line with legislation and council policy. Using your experience and knowledge, you will co-ordinate the assessment of special cases and be the main point of contact for those of particular emergency and public interest. What we need from you It is essential you have a degree level qualification or equivalent e.g. NVQ 4, or significant relevant experience. We require you to have experience in front line housing in a similar setting and an understanding of housing solutions and remedies, to support the needs of vulnerable people and minority groups. Giving the elements of this role, you must have experience in housing or homelessness, including knowledge of housing and homelessness legislation and good understanding of related statutory duties. You will have knowledge and experience of working closely with other specialist agencies and partners, to ensure that housing issues are resolved. You will be able to demonstrate management or supervisory ability in a similar work environment, backed by evidence of appropriate specialist knowledge. What you need to know This is permanent position, working 37 hours per week. Please note that due to the nature of this role, it is a requirement of employment that a Basic Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) check is obtained. How a career at South Gloucestershire Council is different As part of our benefits package, you will receive generous annual leave (pro rata), employee wellbeing support and you will have access to a range of staff discounts , including eye tests, travel, shopping and leisure activities. We recognise that our diverse team of skilled and dedicated people make us a great place to work. We welcome applications from everyone and ensure that individuals are selected, promoted and developed on the basis of their merits and abilities. We know our team work best when they have balance in their lives, and we offer genuine flexibility to help them achieve that work/life balance . We value our staff as individuals, investing in their careers and we are recognised for the quality, breadth and depth of our training and development offer, which helps make the greatest long-term difference in work. Office-based, you’ll be part of a team . If you need specialist expertise or just a bit of advice from someone who’s been there and done it, it’s right there for you. Our teams at South Gloucestershire Council are making a real difference to the lives of people who live, work and learn here. We're building and shaping communities which people are proud of. We're working with the most vulnerable in our community to help them achieve what they want in life. We're investing in our schools to ensure every child and young person in South Gloucestershire achieves their full potential. We've achieved a great deal, but we need talented and dedicated people to ensure we continue to make a difference. We’re making a difference, be part of it