Lettings Officer

**Job title**: Lettings Officer

**Responsible to**: Community Housing Manager

**Role purpose**:

- To work within the Community Housing team to provide comprehensive and pro-active management of the SHS waiting and transfer list.
- To oversee all direct allocations of empty homes in a consistent and customer focussed fashion.
- To work in partnership with Encompass LATC to ensure SHS meets our nomination agreement with the Council for the letting of general needs, housing for older people and housing with care empty homes.

**Key accountabilities**:
To take responsibility for providing an excellent, pro-active, and efficient waiting list, allocations and letting service to prospective SHS residents (tenants) and SHS transferring residents.

To ensure that SHS maximises its income through proactive and timely allocation and lettings of empty homes.

To be the main operational point of contact to ensure our housing nomination obligations are adhered to and delivered.

**SHS waiting list and transfer list**:

- To be competent and confident understanding re-housing legislation and SHS’s Letting policy and procedure, enabling robust decisions in accordance with SHS policy and within suggested procedure timescales.
- Ensure the waiting and transfer list database and systems are properly administered and that initial decisions to join the waiting list comply with the Lettings policy
- To ensure all waiting list correspondence is correctly recorded and archived within the appropriate secure places to ensure SHS complies with statutory General Data Protection

Regulations.

meeting the policy threshold and discussions had to confirm applicant suitability to sustain independent living.)
- Where necessary identify any safeguarding issues, support needs of prospective residents who might benefit from floating support and signposting to other agencies who can help with any housing crisis during their waiting time experience.
- To be confident when undertaking right to rent checks, where appropriate, to establish immigration status.
- Actively participate in reviews and identify any policy, procedural and system reviews that can improve customer experience or value for money.

Manager to identify new stakeholders and or new avenues to promote applicants to join the waiting list.

**Allocations and Empty Homes**:

- Work closely with the Community Housing Manager, Community Housing Officers, and the Asset Manager, keeping track of forthcoming empty homes (including new homes), keeping data records up to date in preparation for a when a property becomes void.
- Determine and seek approval to establish which allocation route is applied for each empty home, in accordance with the lettings policy and nomination agreements.
- For properties to be let by council nomination, prepare appropriate requests in a timely fashion making sure those requests accurately describe the accommodation, rent and service charges, property attributes, accessibility and the expected key dates for future viewing and anticipated tenancy start dates.
- Maintain good working relations with Encompass LATC ensuring all nomination requests are responded to within agreed timescales ensuring any problems or service delays are flagged to the Community Housing Manager.
- Upon receipt of nominated applicants from Encompass, contact the nominees to discuss their nomination and arrange suitable viewings.
- For properties to be let to the SHS direct waiting/transfer list, interrogate the waiting list data base to match applicants whose requirements and needs match the attributes of the empty home. Seek approval and agreement from the patch Community Housing Officer that the shortlist is an accurate working document before contacting applicants.
- Contact shortlisted applicants from the direct waiting list well in advance to discuss the empty home, their position and possible viewing arrangements.
- Prepare and arrange for all applicants to sign their general needs or housing for older people tenancy at the earliest opportunity ensuring all sign up paperwork is accurate; the tenancy obligations are explained, initial advance rent payment is collected and ongoing rent payments agreed.
- Complete all post sign up administration to ensure the new tenancy is created by the resources team and other teams, contractors and stakeholders notified of the tenancy commencement.
- Update CORE entries for all new tenancies.
- In collaboration with the new resident and the patch Community Housing Officer, arrange for all new residents to have a booked settling in visit.
- Undertake and dispatch customer satisfactions surveys seeking feedback on the lettings experience and the happiness with the new home. Collate all responses so they can be reported and analysed by the team.
- Keep all tracking tools updated for our empty homes and letting activities and prepare quarterly returns to Encompass LATC which illustrates all letting activity in that period.
- To support the team