SAC0016
Written evidence submitted anonymously
Re: Q1 I recall something was mentioned with the new contracts re performance measuring and holding the companies to account when performance was poor, but at ground level we don’t see this. It has varied in how easy/difficult it is to claim for missed appointments – sometimes very straightforward, and at other times frustrating. We thankfully have not had to claim very often – but recently we have found it a circular nightmare trying to get Pinnacle/Vivo to show they had logged our repair request, despite having email trails and liaison with the Housing Officer. It seems to be the case that reporting online (where you could screenshot, and/or used to have the option of clicking ‘send a copy to my email’) is better than phone. In the case of the latter, it’s time-consuming and you have no record of the request – various acquaintances have stories of being told their request was never logged, even though they had an appointment text, and so they end up chasing and chasing.
Re: Q3 We have lived in three service families’ accommodations (SFAs) in two different locations; the housing is of varying quality. We have been fortunate not to have experienced damp/mould/leaks. We have had these SFAs under both Amey and Vivo and have not noticed a significant difference between either – no particularly improved quality under the latter. The usual issues remain – communication between a central issue logging and appointment booking organisation ?Pinnacle and their contractors; communication with us; missed appointments; delays; contractors not being given sufficient information about the job they were coming to do, which must be as frustrating for them as it is us. A particular highlight was receiving a letter to say our electricity would be turned off for a day, at 11am on the day it had been turned off. It still happens with other amenities and I don’t quite know why – I’ve never had this issue in all the civilian housing I’ve lived in, where at least annually (and often more frequently) the services were turned off for maintenance.
The promised ‘Home Hub’ still hasn’t materialised, 18 months after the contract came into effect, which is a shame as it would have hopefully solved some of the organisation issues that plague reporting and managing maintenance issues.
Individual contractors are almost always professional, kind and lovely.
The quality of our third (current) SFA is much higher than the other two, both in terms of function and visually. I believe it has been revamped to the ‘Better Homes standard’ and was such a relief to move in to, especially as it was a last-minute reallocation when our chosen house was inspected a month before our move and removed as an option due to leak/damp issues. Frustratingly, speaking to would-be neighbours on that road, the issues had been known about the summer before, when the last occupants had moved out, but no remedial works were undertaken, and it was made available for service families to request in spite of known issues. The house remains empty 6 months on. This seems to be repeated across the UK SFA and it is frustrating to note how many houses are out of action, especially in areas where the housing availability is limited. No photos or floorplans of the single other choice were available so we gambled on it being ok, and thankfully it was. Service families have come up with their own inventive ways of supporting each other in this – using social media to create picture repositories of houses they have just moved out of, for example. Our current SFA is light, pleasant to live in, and feels the most like a home of the three we’ve lived in. It seems to be the exception in our road though – most haven’t had this! Hopefully more will.
Re: Q5 Our second quarter underwent a retrofitting of external insulation and cladding whilst we were in the property; this was stressful to live in (6+ months of scaffolding covering the entire exterior of the house, constant works noise whilst at home with a new baby) but ultimately resulted in a warmer property than we would have faced the next winter. It was still quite cold, and the cost of fuel issue had just kicked in, so we didn’t want to put the heating on too much; working from home involved sitting under a heated blanket and losing the feeling in my feet, which is not an issue unique to SFA. When you bid for or move into an SFA you have no idea of the energy efficiency rating of the property, but even if we did, the choices are often so limited I feel we probably wouldn’t have a ‘good’ choice anyway. Again, I’m sure lots of civilian rented housing has poor energy efficiency too, so we’re not alone in this – but we are often given one choice or nothing.
Re: Q6 The Future Accommodation Model (FAM) sounds very sensible; I haven’t been part of the pilot. It has long been a strange feature of the Armed Forces that a non-officer family with two children live in a two-bed house, and an officer couple with no children live in a 5-bed. Slightly selfishly, I do resonate with the concern expressed by some families of officers that, because we move comparatively often to soldiers (every two years or sometimes more frequently) we might find the housing options worsen for us as we’ll be moving in and out of areas where there are settled soldier populations, and at the bottom of the list for housing. I don’t know how realistic this fear is though…I do think the extreme examples I started this paragraph with still exist and mean that the system must change – especially if it’s shown that it could improve retention and recruitment. It would be nice to have reassurance that there are mitigations planned to ensure improving the system for some wouldn’t disadvantage others.
Overall, the feeling I have around SFA is powerlessness. It feels like such a lottery – whether you’ll see any photos or plans of the house you’re next offered; whether you’ll be offered one close to your serving person’s work or not; whether your next move will not only place you far away from family and friends but also amenities and community; whether the contractor will agree to repair the issue you’ve identified in the property; whether the repair will just be the fifth or sixth temporary fix that issue has had. I’m a positive person, and I can see from all the service families I’ve met that we aim to make the best of things and take these challenges in our stride, but if the Committee can do anything to make it easier, we’ll all be very grateful.
29 September 2023