Since the very beginning of managing Weavervale Housing’s gas contract, Holdcroft Heating had been looking for ways to reduce their no access rates. Although they weren’t necessarily higher than average for running such a contract they were always aware of the cost to the business.
Director Tina Holdcroft explains, “We’ve always had to send 1st appointment letters two weeks before the appointment. This meant doing a mail merge which took a lot of admin time and was a real pain. We’d tried so many ways to increase access rates – sending letters 1st class, phone calls, and nothing had worked.”
Tina then saw an email from Propeller about the customer communication and reminder functionality and thought it might be the solution they’d been looking for, so they decided to just give it a trial one day last July. At 4pm that day, they sent out an SMS reminder from Propeller to all of the tenants with appointments scheduled the following day.
“It was amazing! Literally within seconds the phones started ringing with calls from tenants saying that they’d forgotten, or were away on holiday and asking of they could reschedule. What’s great is that they open the text and all the info is there – the time, date, and also the phone number. If they won’t be in they just tap on the number within the text and it rings us.”
According to Tina it has made a “massive, massive difference”. She explains how they saw the benefit straight away as the no access rate dropped immediately by 5% between July and August 2016 and continued to remain low. When running a social housing contract, this represents a significant drop. They have now been using it for a year and she explains the other benefits that they have seen, all through using this system:
Cost Savings
Less no accesses mean less wasted engineer time. Comparing access rates before and after implementing the system, Holdcroft are now able to complete on average an extra 33 jobs every month. You can imagine the cost savings and additional revenue that this has brought, and would bring to any business.
Less Admin Time
The time spent generating the letters through a mail merge has disappeared. Now with a few clicks, every text, email and letter is generated automatically. Not only that but less time has to be spent organising follow up visits.
Added Value & Company Image
Tina explains also that “Weavervale Housing have been very happy that we’re saving money whilst running the contract more efficiently. We’re seen as a company who is one step ahead due to our use of technology. Obviously for tendering that puts us in a very strong position. We’re now consistently 100% compliant, not just to by month, but day to day – something that’s almost unheard of.”
“For us as company owners, it’s an absolute Godsend – you’re adding value to the client whilst saving money!”