Regulation

Campbell Tickell offers expert, tailored and practical support to help you understand and comply with regulatory expectations

From April 2024, the Social Housing (Regulation) Act 2023 changed the way all registered providers are regulated. It also  puts the Housing Ombudsman’s Complaints Handling Code on a statutory footing. The sector must also comply with the expectations of a new Building Safety Regulator.

Building on our existing IDA support offer, we can help housing associations, local authorities, ALMOs and for-profit providers respond to these changes. Our support can be tailored to your requirements, for example providing briefings on the regulatory framework, assistance with self-assessment of compliance, help to develop assurance frameworks, and/or practice for inspection.

Our key areas of support:

1. Building understanding of consumer regulation

   Draw on us to:

   • Help Executive teams, Boards, Council members, staff and/or tenants understand regulatory expectations.
   • Work through with you how consumer regulation compliance can become an embedded part of how you maintain high standards in your homes and services, rather than feeling like an onerous tick-box exercise.

2. Assessing and achieving compliance

   Draw on us to:

   • Help you take a good look in the mirror and understand the extent to which you comply with the consumer standards (including support with self-assessment)
   • Organise, scrutinise, and validate the assurance which underpins your ability to demonstrate compliance
   • Design an assurance framework which brings structure and rigour to your understand of compliance
   • Act as a critical friend to leaders, managers, and operational teams.
   • Support you to develop action plans to address any gaps, including identifying priorities and understanding resource implications
   • Help you to base decisions on richer evidence through targeted and risk-based ‘deep dive’ checks to provide assurance in key areas

3. Prepare for regulatory inspection

   Draw on us to:

   • Help you understand what to expect and how best to prepare
   • Review documents through a regulatory lens
   • Provide rehearsal and coaching for inspection
   • Conduct soft benchmarking against good practice

From 1 April 2024, the Housing Ombudsman’s Complaints Handling Code is on a statutory footing for registered providers. Campbell Tickell offer a range of services and support including compliance checks, root cause analysis, governance related work, and a CultureScan focused specifically around complaints.

1. Compliance –  Providing a tailored approach to assessing and testing compliance with the Complaints Handling Code. We can give an external and experienced source of assurance.
2.  Investigation – Experienced in investigating a range of difficult issues, including individual and thematic complaints. We can help to identify root causes and support with a robust lessons learnt approach.
3. Training and support – The Complaints Handling Code includes specific senior roles for staff and members of the governing body (usually Board or Council). We can provide training and support around the specific responsibilities for these roles, and the requirements for governing bodies overall.
4. CultureScan – Based on our tried and tested organisational CultureScan, our Complaints CultureScan has been developed to help clients to develop measurable insights into how different parts of the organisation view and respond to complaints. Using a two stage methodology including a digital survey and follow up focus groups, the Complaints CultureScan enables clients to build data-driven action plans and bridge the gap between current and desired culture.

Contact CT Directors, Catherine Little or Ceri Victory-Rowe to find out more.

In depth assessments (IDAs) continue to evolve and will change further as new Consumer Regulation is rolled out. Recent changes include a greater focus on stock condition, stress testing, recovery planning, and building and resident safety.

We have helped more than 100 housing associations to build the confidence of their non-executive directors and executive team and to deliver clear assurance to the regulator.

Preparing for in depth assessment – helping you to shine

Our services cover:

• Introductory presentations and interactive workshops for Boards
• Reviewing and refreshing key documents to help shape your narrative
• Rehearsing and coaching interviewees to confidently describe your ambitions, structures and risks
• Identifying areas of strength and opportunities for improvement ahead of scrutiny by the Regulation of Social Housing;
• Critical friend input on key elements such as document mapping, briefing notes, stress-testing and risk management;
• Post-IDA remedial support.

Delivering clear assurance to the housing regulator

Our IDA clients include for-profits, supported housing and recently merged providers, plus several of the pilots for the new consumer inspection regime.

We are proud to have recently supported both L&G Affordable Homes – the first for-profit RP to be confirmed as G1 V1, and Clarion – who retained their G1. And we are pleased that many clients have returned to us to help with their second and third IDAs.

Over 80% of the RPs we have supported have achieved a positive IDA outcome in retaining or improving their G/V grading. For others, our advice has been key to delivering a clear and focused action plan that addresses regulatory concerns and builds RSH confidence, supporting a rapid return to the previous grading.

Alongside our support to prepare for inspection, we can provide a range of assistance to prepare social landlords more broadly for the changes to regulation – including self-assessment, ‘health checks’ and developing your approach to assurance.

We are familiar with the various Regulatory Standards in place across the UK and Ireland. We can assess compliance (or validate an organisation’s self-assessments) against any aspect of them, either in full, or targeted at a particular standard or requirement.

We can also assess compliance with codes of governance such as the NHF Code of Governance, the UK Corporate Governance Code and the Charity Governance Code.

We can provide assistance and support in the completion and validation of regulatory returns. Where inaccuracies occur, we can help organisations resolve them, and put in place controls to ensure they are avoided in future.

Where an organisation experiences regulatory compliance issues, of whatever level of severity, we can help identify root causes (including systemic factors), map out the path to recovery and provide ongoing support and advice to enable organisations to resolve matters. This can include support with developing voluntary undertakings and improvement action plans, as well as with validating improvement work undertaken.

We support organisations seeking to become registered social housing landlords. We help with the creation of documentation, establishing governance structures, financial modelling and application submissions to the relevant regulator.